The Tragedy of Bellatrix Black
by Slytherite
Summary: Going insane can be such an ugly process. Especially when you, dear readers, know how it's all going to end... What happened to Bellatrix to drive her so insane? Why did she marry Rodolphus? How did she become a Death Eater? Let's find out... Please R&R!
1. Act One: The Tragedy Begins

**Disclaimer: Sue? No, dear Bella is canon, and she's not a very pleasant person to boot. ...that wasn't what you meant, was it?**

**A/N: Ladles and jellyspoons, come one, come all, and watch the tragedy unfold. Make sure not to get any chocolate on the seats. No, we don't sell popcorn, this is a tragedy, dammit! You're ruining the mood!  
(cough) Riiiiight. Anyway, this is my first attempt at a continuing series, blah blah blah, not going to be too good, I'll try to update frequently but please remember that I have very little work ethic. It also covers a span of about nineteen years, from the time Bellatrix enters Hogwarts to her arrest, so it might well take me years to finish. I'll try to keep it from becoming a deadfic, though.**

**Anyway, the main focus of this story is going to be Bellatrix, obviously, but I might devote a chapter or two to other people--Rodolphus, Narcissa, Voldy-mort, you know the drill. I'm going to rate it T to start with for language, disturbing content, implied sexuality/limes in the later chapters, and likely some violence, but I'd rather raise the rating than bowdlerize the writing. Just so you know. Pairings will include Voldetrix, Bellaphus, Lucissa (background only), and possible Rodolstan.**

**Okay, I've blathered long enough. Let the tragedy...begin!**

The whole family had come to see her off.

Cygnus and Druella, dear Father and Mother, had been so terribly pleased when Bellatrix got the letter. Of course, it was only a formality, a girl from such an important Wizarding family was practically guaranteed to be a witch, and they had seen Bellatrix's talent from an early age. She had been such an enthusiastic little sorceress, making the spiders in the corners dance (or so she said) before Kreacher swept them away from her delicate hands and her expensive velvet robes. But still...it was The Letter. The one that marked her among the ranks of the privileged and gave her oh-so-proud parents something to gush about to anyone who would bother to listen. The one that secured her a future, probably a husband and two or three children and the occasional social occasion. The one that every mother wanted for her daughter. The Letter.

Little Narcissa had talked of nothing else, somehow making the topic last from the quiet October evening the owl tapped on the window to the harried September morning when they left for King's Cross. She had been so excited for Bella, thrilled to think that she was going to go off and become a powerful witch and, better yet, meet some charming rich boy, especially one with a handsome younger brother. That, Bellatrix suspected, was all she was really interested in. Not the magic. Not the power to change the world as you saw fit. The prestige, the stupid ornate empty shell, the trappings. It made Bellatrix so sick. To get anywhere in life, you had to have both, the pretty wrapper and the raw strength that it could hold. She had tried to explain this to Narcissa, but of course she had nodded and smiled and gone on blithering. So, inevitably, had Mother and Father and Andromeda and Uncle Orion and Aunt Walburga and even Cousin Sirius and Cousin Regulus. Not one of them understood what Bellatrix could do. Or what she could do with the world.

And here she was. Going off to the one place where she would learn how to use her abilities. As if she couldn't use them already. Had they seen the pigeons? The sparrows? The cat that had meowed at the wrong doorstep?  
No. Of course they hadn't.  
But they would see. In time. Of course they would. She knew exactly how powerful she was. Pigeons didn't settle on their roof anymore. She rather disliked pigeons, on the whole, and was glad to see them gone.

The train must have pulled up without her noticing. She had been staring off into the distance, thinking, remembering how sweet those little moments had been, nearly brushing an imaginary feather off her robes before the appearance of the bloody red train snapped her back to reality. Uncle Orion was tapping her rather hard on the shoulder--she jerked away from him, twisting around and glaring into his slate-gray eyes.  
"What? What is it?" Orion's smile looked fake, artificially cheery, the corners of his mouth disappearing into his handlebar mustache. "Well, girl? You'll be in Slytherin, I suppose?" She made a note of his grammar--no doubt it would impress the professors, show them immediately that she was someone worth reckoning with.  
"Oh. Yes. Of course." She sounded a little bit distracted, even to herself, less and less interested with every word. Orion was a bit boring, really, brisk and chipper, gentlemanly, but not too terribly deep or interesting to talk to. No doubt he had deep personal issues, somewhere underneath the stupid hat and stupider mustache, ripping his heart into tiny little shreds and making him into a shell of his former self. As if she cared about the idiot. He ought to go lie down on the train tracks... Pleasantly bloody images swarmed her mind. Without her conscious input--her mind was watching Orion's tragically premature death--, her face twisted itself into a smile, her hooded black eyes unfocusing.

"Bella. Bella!" Andromeda waved a hand in front of her face, looking resigned. It was a struggle to pull herself back to reality. She really would have to do something about that, it wouldn't impress the teachers much, they might think she was just a touch dull. But the things she could do with her mind...so pretty...they just wouldn't understand. Even Narcissa didn't, even though she tried, oh, yes, she tried. Andromeda hadn't even tried. Andromeda would fit under the train, might not even be missed too much.  
"Oh, go away, why don't you?" But the damage was done, of course, she couldn't bring the thoughts back, couldn't lose herself again. Stupid, stupid, stupid Andromeda.  
"There's no call for that! I was only trying to help, you know!" Andromeda thought she knew better...

All in all, Bellatrix was not in a good mood as her family swarmed her and said their goodbyes, or maybe their orders. She could barely see the train behind them, Mother's skirts and Father's cloak and Orion's stupid hat blocking her view. Go away, go away, she didn't need them, not now.  
"Be a good girl, Bella!"  
"Send us lots of letters!"  
"We want to hear everything." Yes, she supposed they did. This was what she had been born to do, after all.  
"Don't embarrass us, Bellatrix, or I'll make your life a living hell!" Ahh, Auntie Walburga. Always pleasant.  
"Goodbye, Bella! I'll miss you forever and ever and..." Stop blathering and shut up, Narcissa.

It was a relief to get into the train, away from them and their idiotic orders. Of course she wouldn't make a fool of herself. That would bring shame on her whole family, would it not? And she couldn't have that...no, she would do well. Of course she would. She always did. She wasn't nervous about anything. Whatever it was, she would conquer it. In her own bloody way.

**A/N: Dun-dun-dun-duuuuuuuuun!  
Don't ask what happened to the pigeons. Believe me, you don't want to know. They're in a better place now.**

**What do you guys think? Good? Bad? ZOMG-this-chick-is-nuts? Please review! (I mean, you've wasted this much time, might as well waste some more...) Please? (pause) If you review, you can have popcorn for the next chapter, mmkay?**

**Next Chapter: Bellatrix gets an unwanted love interest!**


	2. Act Two: The Future Death Eaters

**Disclaimer: I belong to Bellatrix, not the other way around.  
A/N: Ladies and gentlemen, Bellatrix gets a love interest! Whether or not she actually wants one. Also, she's on a train. And she makes some friends. And everybody eats candy and is happy.**

**For those who reviewed last time, popcorn is available in the lobby for free. You might want to hurry, I think Ron just walked off with a lot of it.**

**Basically, this chapter is an excuse to introduce some of Bellatrix's Hogwarts friends and give them unimaginative first names. (Evan, however, IS Rosier's canon first name. Yes, I know these things. Yes, I am a Harry Potter geek.)**

**Yes, I know this one is a little more comedic than tragic in mood. That was kind of intentional, to set up the contrast between the happy, fluffy first chapters, where everyone is nice and alive and (mostly) sane, and the depths of insanity and despair that will come later. And yes, I am blatantly making excuses for my inability to write. I hope you enjoy it.**

Bellatrix had never been on a train before. Her family was too important to take trains, filthy Muggle trains, smelling of coal and steam and dirt. The inside was nicer than she would have expected--walnut and brass and red silk, with candles on the walls. Pretty. She could see her reflection in the brass candleholder, distorted so her eyes looked huge and her shiny black hair barely touched her shoulders when she knew it reached her hips. She was still wearing her casual robes, purple silk with a high collar, making her look much older than eleven. Other students brushed past her impatiently, but she ignored them, jolted out of her contemplation only when the train jerked into motion, dumping her on the carpet. One minute she was staring into her own eyes, the next she was staring at the walnut paneling, lying on her side with her hair falling over her face and her right arm twisted underneath her. The floor was vibrating, echoing the wheels underneath it, and incidentally rubbing rather painfully against her face. Her shoulder felt like it was melting into the carpet. It took a moment for her to marshal her thoughts and realize that she was humiliated. If anyone had seen her...if anyone had dared look...she would humilate them. She would. She would make things right, the way they should be. It was a matter of honor, of course it was, it was a matter of dignity.  
Seconds passed. She almost didn't dare look up. No one was there, thankfully enough. The corridor looked deserted, the only sign of life the dull murmur of conversation from the neighboring compartments, almost drowned out by the thrumming of the engine. But that wasn't right...couldn't be right...there was someone. There was. He was standing at the end of the compartment, barely visible in the dusty shadows, watching. Not even bothering to hide. It was a little insulting that he hadn't hidden when he saw her look up. Even though it made things so much easier on her.  
"You! Down there!" He stared at her vacantly. She was already halfway down the corridor, dragging her trunk behind her, her wand slipping out of her pocket. "I can see you!" He nodded, not bothering to move out of the way. Whack. She had thought she had hit him rather hard, hard enough to shove him into the wall, but he remained standing where he was, his dark brown eyes fixed on her face. Silent. It annoyed her that he was silent. People should talk when you hit them. It made it more fun. She tried again. This time he winced slightly.  
"You dropped your wand." Bellatrix glanced around. She had dropped her wand, in fact. It was lying a few feet behind her. Embarrassment and anger trickling down her spine, she picked it up and pointed it at his throat. Inexplicably, he grinned. "Go ahead." No, this wasn't right, this wasn't how it was supposed to go.  
"Give me a reason." Feeble attempt. Probably everyone had said that at some time. He just laughed, his eyes remaining fixed on Bellatrix's.  
"You're beautiful." Her hand dropped. This was ridiculous, he wasn't worth the time.  
"Freak"  
"I know." He smiled again, more warmly. Somehow, that was unnerving.  
He put one hand on the door of the compartment to their left and pulled. It slid open. Bellatrix waited for him to go in, but he just stood there, waiting for her to walk in first. Visions of his bloody death swam, unbidden, into Bellatrix's mind. They were comforting enough. She stepped into the compartment. He followed her in, yanking the door closed behind him.

There were three other boys sitting in the compartment--a blond and two brunets. The brunets could have been anyone (although they looked about her age), but Bellatrix vaguely recognized the blond. It took a minute for her to remember where she'd seen him.  
"You're Rosier. Evan. Evan Rosier." He looked up immediately, excited. Yes, it was the same one from the family photographs, Mother's little cousin or something close to it. Tall, willowy, with wavy ash-blond hair and a receding chin. Aristocratic. Refined. The stereotype of a wealthy boy.  
"Bellatrix, right?" She nodded stiffly.  
"Bellatrix..." The first boy was still staring at her. From him, her name sounded like a prayer. "Pretty name. You're pureblood, right? Sounds like a pureblood name." Well, of course it did. No Mudblood would be named Bellatrix, would they, now? Honestly, the stupidity of some people...It made her sick.  
"Did you figure that out by yourself, or did you have help?" It was almost a relief when he stomped on her foot and she could hit him. Rosier and the two others watched with perverse interest.

When the toad-faced prefect girl came in, Bellatrix had already made up her mind that she rather liked him. It took courage, or a sort of mad suicidal stupidity, to attack her after she'd shown what she could do. And he had hurt a girl. Gentlemen didn't hurt girls.  
They were going to be such good friends.  
"What are your names"  
"Bellatrix Artemis Black"  
"Rodolphus Dante Lestrange." Dante?  
"Thank you. If I hear any more fighting, those names are going directly to Professor Dumbledore." Bellatrix's nails dug into her hands, a warm trickle of blood dribbling from one palm. Toad Face was going to die, to bleed, to hurt like Bellatrix was hurting with humiliation, her name was going to burn...Yes, that would work, she would burn, bound and gagged with her head in the fireplace.  
The door closed behind Toad Face. Lestrange and Bellatrix exchanged glances. He didn't look surprised when she hit him, smearing blood across his face. It was nothing personal, of course, sometimes you just had to hurt someone. He looked like he understood that. Her anger was going away now, a little bit, anyway, replaced by curiosity.  
"Dante"  
"Blame my mother." She watched Lestrange for a while, taking in the details of his appearance. Brown eyes, dull, dead ones. Shaggy brown hair, uneven and badly cut, reaching his broad shoulders. He was handsome, very handsome, she supposed, or at least looked enough like other men (well, boys) who earned the label to deserve it. (She, as a rule, thought of no one as handsome.) About her height, tall for an eleven-year-old boy. His civilian robes were rather plain, dark red velvet with no frills or decorations. He had finally stopped staring at her, instead glaring at the wall as if it deserved a horrible death at his hands. "Interesting wall?" It took him a moment to answer.  
"Oh. Nah, not really." One of the brunets snickered. Bellatrix pointed her wand at his throat, and he stopped at once.  
"Put that away, Black, you're going to hurt me and I'm going to have to go to the hospital wing and I'm going to miss my classes and flunk out of school and it'll all be your fault--" Lestrange hit him. (Bellatrix mentally thanked him.) He fell backwards like a bowling pin. Bellatrix regarded him coolly, his bloody death playing through her mind.  
"And you are...?" His voice came out as a squeak.  
"Jonathan Avery!" She had heard of his family, vaguely. Not as rich as the Blacks, or as prominent, but it wouldn't do to send him home in a body bag. She turned to the other brunet, shorter and slighter than Lestrange, better-looking than Avery.  
"And you"  
"Edmund Wilkes." He grimaced as she burst out laughing at the name, her eyes shut tightly, her head thrown back, gasping for breath.

They talked for the rest of the train ride. There was a lot of time to talk. They used all of it.  
"What house do you guys want to be in?" Rosier, Bellatrix decided almost at once, was too cheerful and friendly for his own good. People like that annoyed her, as a rule, grated across every nerve she possessed. Rosier seemed bright enough, and useful enough, that maybe she could excuse it...He would probably expect her to call him "Evan". But she wouldn't. She wouldn't. Nothing so familiar.  
"Slytherin. I'm speaking for all of us, I think." Wilkes looked offended that Rosier would ask such a basic question. Didn't all the young witches and wizards from the good families go to Slytherin?  
"Of course, right?" Rosier kept babbling happily, perhaps unaware that he had insulted Wilkes's family. "Doesn't everyone? Everyone decent, I mean, not the Mudbloods." They nodded, listening. "I mean, can you imagine? Mudbloods in Slytherin?" Bellatrix smirked, flicking her hand disdainfully. Avery leaned forward, his eyes wide, excited to know something Rosier didn't.  
"There've been some, though. Scum gets everywhere, even in Hogwarts." Lestrange rolled his eyes.  
"You sound like Rabastan. Complainer." Bellatrix frowned.  
"Rabastan"  
"Brother. He's eight." Wilkes almost smiled.  
"That little prettyboy with the funny eyes?" Rosier looked uncomfortable, but Lestrange nodded.  
"Yeah"  
"He cried when the train left." Lestrange's eyes blazed, and he nearly hit his head on the suitcase rack as he stood up suddenly. "That's not true"  
"It is." Wilkes's voice was sullen; Rosier edged away from him a little. Avery, who had been sitting next to Lestrange, glowered at them. Lestrange whirled to face him, breathing hard, his face flushed.  
"You leave Rabastan alone. You leave my family alone." Bellatrix started laughing again. She couldn't help it. The thoughts were coming back into her mind...wouldn't it be funny if Wilkes had had a knife? They could all knock each other off right there, and then the teachers would find the compartment smeared with blood and their lifeless corpses in a heap...wouldn't it be sad? Wouldn't it be funny?

Wilkes didn't have a knife, though, and none of them knew any spells, so the fight ended there. After that their conversation drifted to Quidditch, and then to brooms. Just as Bellatrix was about to slip back into the pleasant daydreams of blood and tragedy, Avery asked something that whipped her mind back to reality.  
"What do you lot want to do when you grow up? I think...I want to be Minister for Magic, maybe I can do some good there"  
"Yeah, as someone to blame." They looked at Wilkes, who shrugged. "I hate politicians. They're all corrupt anyway." Rosier looked hurt.  
"My uncle William's in Law Enforcement." "Sorry"  
"No, it's all right. He's an idiot, mother's always saying so." Bellatrix thought she might have seen him in one of the family pictures. Her side of the family never spoke to people like that, of course, you always got bad seeds. In all the best families. Someone should do something to stamp that out...it wasn't right...she could do it. Squibs and blood traitors and black sheeps. They'd all have to go. She could do it. It would be easy, so easy, with ability like hers. It was simple. She had been born for it.  
Maybe the look in her eyes had given her thoughts away. "What do you want to do, Black"  
"I want to get rid of people like your uncle." Avery snorted. She kicked him. "I'm serious, gentlemen. That's what I want to do." Rosier frowned.  
"Not a bad idea, Bella--" No. Not Bella. That was too close, too intimate.  
"Black"  
"Not a bad idea, Black, then, but how would you do it?" It was an insulting question. As if she couldn't manage a few spells. Had he seen the pigeons? No. Of course he hadn't. He didn't know about the pigeons. Nobody at Hogwarts would. It was simple, then, she would have to show them. Then everybody would know what she could do to them. They would be afraid of her. That would be good for her, it would make everything easier.  
"If you can't think of a way, maybe you should be in Hufflepuff with all the other stupid people." The expression on his face was worth remembering. Hurt. Astonishing that a few words could provoke such a reaction. She was a connoisseur of pain, on the whole, knew how to get the reactions she wanted. (Except with Lestrange. And even he had buttons she could push, he had to, everyone did, she had just seen one of them and it was only a matter of finding the others. And she would find them.) She would remember this, it might be useful. Everything might be useful.  
"I'm not stupid"  
"Yes, you are." His gaze dropped to his knees. She had won. She would win more. It was like chess, but with thoughts and words and emotions. Easy once you knew how.  
"That was low." Wilkes's muttered comment, presumably a heartfelt expression of his deepest feelings, was more amusing than painful. Who would bother?  
"It was, wasn't it?" The conversation died out after that. There wasn't much more to say. Lestrange spent a few miles staring out the window--Bellatrix watched him for a while. She could tell that they were going to be good friends, which was irritating. She had no category to put him in, the way she could pigeonhole Rosier as a pansy and Wilkes as a malcontent and Avery as a whiner. He was annoying and fascinating, calm and hotheaded, idiotic or apathetic, couldn't tell which, blah blah blah, as if she cared. The trouble was that she did.  
No doubt dear Narcissa would have said that this was a sign that they were a perfect match, but Narcissa was always coming up with nonsense like that. It went with being seven and a complete twit. As far as Bellatrix was concerned, romance was out of the picture. After all, who could honestly be good enough? Honestly? No one. There was no one who could equal her.  
Lestrange might make a good second-in-command, though. A good friend.  
She had never had friends apart from Narcissa. She had been too different, too bright, too talented. Now, however, she suspected that she had just made four of them. Hooray. What fun they would have.

There was something odd in the way Lestrange was watching the birds outside the window...something predatory.  
What fun they would have.

By Avery's watch, it was a little after five when the compartment door slid open and a young woman poked her head in.  
"Hungry?" Yes, they were. Bellatrix hadn't eaten before they left, there had been too much to do, sending Kreacher on last-minute errands and packing all of her things, and the hunger pangs were starting. The cart the young witch was pushing had candy, so much candy, pretty candy for those with the money for it. And it wasn't expensive. Just to impress the boys, as if they needed any more, she dug some gold out of her pockets and bought whatever they asked for. Just as a gesture, of course. Between friends. It was the civilized thing to do. It restarted the conversation, anyway.  
"You...like chocolate?" Lestrange smirked, ripping the paper off a chocolate frog.  
"Obviously." Avery must have decided not to pursue the subject. Lestrange didn't blink much. Bellatrix didn't bother wondering why.  
"Hooray. Hengist of Woodcroft, I'm thrilled." His expression unreadable again, he tossed the card at Rosier, who caught it by the tips of his fingers.  
"Thanks"  
"It wasn't a present. Unless your family's gone poor, then you can think of it as charity." Avery giggled. Bellatrix kicked him again. He annoyed her. She wondered if she could get the window open, quietly testing it with her hand while the others were focused on Lestrange and Rosier...it moved a little, but not enough to put Avery through it. She closed it again, noticing as she did so that Wilkes was giving her a very strange look. Well, he could go ahead and do that, there was no reason to stop him, really. She prodded him with her wand anyway.  
"We have not! Why is everyone so determined to insult me?" Rosier was turning dark red, like a pear, his blond eyebrows the places where the pear's skin had been peeled away. It was a nice thought.  
"We don't like you," Bellatrix informed him. He looked, pleading with his eyes, at Wilkes, who seemed caught off guard, his face reddening a bit as well.  
"Don't give me that, Rosier, I don't mind you much." Rosier laughed ruefully.  
"I expect that that's the best I'll get. Good enough." They ate the candy in silence for a few minutes, Wilkes looking more and more uncomfortable with each tick of Avery's silver wristwatch. Finally, things apparently came to a head inside whatever little pocket of his mind concerned being nice to people.  
"Sorry!" All four of them looked at him. He glared defiantly back. "What?" Bellatrix laughed suddenly. She couldn't ever help it.  
"Give me your cauldron cake." He handed it over. The dark chocolate filling was still a little warm and gooey from the cart. She ate it.

After that, the tension in the air faded while they talked. Avery had some cards, and they played poker for an hour, two hours, maybe three, Bellatrix wasn't counting. The food was gone, anyway, and it was getting dark outside their window. She could see stars. Sirius, of course, that was an easy one to find. The constellation Orion, the first one she had memorized, and...up there, in the corner...her star. Bellatrix. Bright and beautiful...and on fire, irritatingly enough, even though she tried to forget and just think about how beautiful it was. Burning, burning, and one day it would all burn up and there would be nothing left but a shell and a note in the astronomy books, the history books.  
She was being stupid. She wasn't going to burn.

She turned back to the game, just in time to watch Avery bet twenty-three Galleons (they didn't have any chips) on a weak hand. Lestrange won the money. Shaking her head, her hair swirling around her face, she returned to the game and, exploiting their fear of her for everything it was worth, won fifty Galleons and three Sickles from her new friends in less than an hour.

**A/N: Hope you enjoyed that. It took me longer to write than chapter one for some reason, don't ask me why. Dialogue is hard. (facepalm) Also, don't ask why Bellatrix falls on her face. Mainly, she does it because I wanted to write her falling on her face. Just for comic relief.  
I imagined Umbridge would have been in her mid-to-late forties in OotP, which would have put her as a sixth or seventh year when Bellatrix showed up on the scene. Don't think they would have liked each other too much :P Yep, she'll be coming back in later chapters (hooray for blatant foreshadowing!). We couldn't let her get away without Bellatrix getting revenge, right?**

**Don't ask about the middle names. Wizard names are bloody hard. (On this one I'm inclined to agree with Bellatrix--DANTE?! What was I thinking?)**

**And now, for your entertainment, I shall...respond to the reviews. Yaay.  
toujourspurPAL: Why, thank you! Compliments make me happy :) Make sure to get your free popcorn.  
kirameru1701: I was feeling both Victorian and silly when I wrote that. The rest of the story, not so much.  
Sienna Rhiannon Chase: Eeep. Okay, okay, I'm updating, I'm updating! I don't want to wind up like the pigeons! Somebody help me.  
ILoveRodolphusLestrange: Are you psychic? Actually, I had already decided to introduce Rodolphus in this chapter, AND make him gorgeous and interesting, before I read your review. Weird, huh? (I have a soft spot for the Lestranges. Guess I'm not the only one.) Don't worry, you can keep your popcorn...unless you don't like popcorn or are allergic or something, in which case we also have assorted tasty snacks.  
Sheograph: Exactly how I think she'd be as well. Although perhaps that goes without saying. (Writing in-character is hard. Aargh.)**

**Remember, if you review, you get popcorn, and the entertainment of me responding to your reviews in my A/N. If that actually counts as entertainment. I dunno. Anyway, watch out for the next chapter.**

**Next Chapter: Will Bellatrix, In Fact, Be A Slytherin? (Yes.)**


	3. Act Three: Welcome To Hogwarts

**Disclaimer: I do indeed own Harry Potter. All seven of the books, the two schoolbooks, and three British editions, as well as piles of assorted merchandise. My college fund belongs to J.K.Rowling.  
A/N: Welcome to another exciting (?) chapter, known to its friends Act One and Act Two as...Act Three. Not very interesting names, I'm afraid, but there you go.**

**The Plot So Far: Bellatrix decides that she has a ZOMGGrate Deztiny, gets on a train, and makes friends with cheerfully aristocratic Rosier, grumpy-bear Wilkes, whiny and unsympathetic Avery, and enigmatic, (deliberately?) infuriating, possibly psychotic Lestrange. She also thinks about pigeon-related violence a lot.**

**Those of you who have previously reviewed, please bring your tickets over to the concessions stand for free popcorn, and, by request, Oreos. Those of you who have not previously reviewed...shame on you. ;) Those of you who are reading this for the first time, I hope you enjoy it and post extremely complimentary reviews. Reviews will be rewarded with free popcorn.**

**Rereading the second chapter, I noticed that I had slipped out of Bellatrix's...unusual...speaking style (and made her sound older than eleven) a bit in places, so I tried to fix that on this one, rambling a bit more, being a bit less grammatically correct, what have you. (I wrote most of Act One in the middle of the night, while extremely tired. Perhaps that had something to do with it. Unfortunately, I'm writing this in the middle of the day, while slightly hyperactive, so there you are.)**

**I suppose I should warn you that this chapter contains some references to doing rather violent things to one's unfortunate younger sisters and cousins (not shown on-page, though). Possibly a little much for younger readers. But what the hell, it's about Bellatrix. You guys probably expect some violence and disturbing-ness.**

**Sit back, relax, and enjoy. (muffled singing) Whoever just sat on the Sorting Hat, please, for the love of Potter, stop it.**

She had won so much money when the train stopped. Poor Avery might have to explain some things to his mum and dad when he wrote home. Seventy-four Galleons, two Sickles, and a Knut. Shiny, new coins. Poor, poor Avery. He looked so disappointed, as if he'd expected to win four fortunes with three cards and a poker face. People like that, stupid people, were really asking for it. If only she'd had time to win more.

The corridor was intolerable. Full of clumsy, stupid children babbling about idiotic things. Shut up. Shut up shut up shut up. Some girl had her trunk with her, as if she hadn't heard the announcement "...your luggage will be taken to the school separately." Idiot. As she walked by, Bellatrix quietly took hold of her hair and pulled. The girl shrieked. Bellatrix dropped the hank of hair immediately, save for a few frizzy orange strands that had stuck to her hand. Oh, how nice. She wiped her hand off on someone's robes (they had all changed into their school robes, of course, the Mudbloods and half-bloods were indistinguishable from the rest). Nobody knew it had been her.  
There was a hand resting on her left shoulder. A hand, right. On her shoulder, yes. At first she hoped it was only someone in the crowd, that it would be there only for a few seconds, but no luck.  
"Bella?" Lestrange had an odd voice, a voice she could recognize even after knowing him for at most nine hours. Like red wine, or dark chocolate. Deep. Sensual. It didn't sound like it belonged to an eleven-year-old boy. Lestrange was enough of an enigma without that voice. And he called her Bella. He called her Bella.  
"What?" If he wanted his money back, she wouldn't give it to him. She had won it, it was hers, go away.  
"Can I walk with you?" She nearly lost him in the crush of students, nearly shoved one of the boys in front of her aside and gotten away from him. They were getting off the train, piling onto a little wooden platform that was creaking under the weight of so many, many students. Beside her, someone tripped, tried to force their way back up, and was trampled. She paused to look, trying to see the face, noting with pleasure the cuts on their hands, and then her opportunity was gone. Lestrange should just have left her alone, of course, he should have, they hardly knew one another. "How nice of you to ask. Yes. Now kindly shut up." He didn't say anything after that. Just held onto her shoulder for dear life.

"Firs' years! Firs' years! Over here!" Bellatrix broke away from the crowd with the rest of the first years, a few here, a few there, trickling out of the mass of students and toward the voice. Away from the lights of the train, into the pitch blackness where nobody could see a thing and some unlucky boy might fall and break his neck. Stumbling off the platform, onto pebbles she could feel through the soles of her shoes, onto a little dirt track with trees on the other side. She was in the middle of the group, surrounded by people, Lestrange's hand nearly slipping off her shoulder as they walked (she was doing nothing to encourage this, but of course, nothing to discourage it either). Avery and Wilkes and Rosier were all here, presumably, somewhere, unless they had gotten lost...oh, wouldn't it be funny if they'd gotten lost?  
"Who's up there? Bella, can you see?" Lestrange was standing closer to her than she'd thought, his breath warm on the back of her neck. Go away. Go away. Don't get obsessed with dear Bella, now. Don't use that name. Don't be too familiar. They were hardly lovers.  
"No, I can't. Why would I be able to? How should I--"  
"Okay." She could see a little, actually, just enough, someone up front had lit a lantern or a candle or a wand. It was an obvious lie, he could probably see just as well as she could, but she was unsure that he'd noticed. But there was someone, someone tall enough for her to see...

And then the trees on one side of them dropped away (she hadn't noticed that there had been trees), and they were standing on the edge of a cliff looking out over a massive black lake, and then there was Hogwarts Castle, no, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, bright like a toy, like one of Narcissa's useless pretty jeweled things. It wasn't pretty, of course, the stonework was old and falling to pieces, but it was so majestic, so grand, such a nice little symbol of Wizarding power. One thousand years, bringing up the children of the witches and the wizards, grooming them for power and for privilege and teaching them everything they would need to know. She would learn from the masters and from those who had taught the masters, and maybe some day if she was a very good student...oh, she would be such a good student.  
Under the eye of Albus Dumbledore. She had heard his name so many, many times. The people's headmaster, the downtrodden and the filthy and the pathetic people. They adored him. He was so wonderfully nice, so understanding. She could see him as having been a pansy like Rosier, always looking for friends... Oh well, it couldn't be helped. She would fake adoration, learn what she could from him, he might well be gone when it was time for her to graduate, off to be Minister and mismanage the country. Some people never learned, did they?  
"An' tha's Hogwarts for yeh!" Well, thank you, they could never have figured that out on their own, they were all so slow and needed to be told.  
Yeh? What sort of person said that? Was it some sort of accent, did people really talk like that, or was the speaker just a monumental dunce? She could see him (she was sure it was a him, no woman had a voice like they were choking on roaches and gravel) sillhouetted against the night sky, hulking and massive, hints of beard and bushy hair visible around the edges. Oh Merlin. What sort of monster could this possibly be? Surely no teacher...oh no. No no no no no.  
"Who is he?"  
"I heard he's a professor."  
"Nah, he works for the gamekeeper."  
The freak must have heard the boys near the edge of the crowd whispering. "Old Ogg retired last year, this is me first year as gamekeeper. Hagrid's the name. Yeh are?" He didn't sound angry, as she'd hoped he might be, just...friendly. To the degree of idiocy. Of course, he was a gamekeeper.  
"Kevin Roper."  
"Nathan Quidley."  
"Herbert Jenkins." None of them were from prominent families, she knew that much. Probably they were there on assistance. So many, many poor boys. And they would be her classmates.  
She would look so brilliant next to them. Would they be Slytherins? Slytherin himself wouldn't have taken that muck...she knew the stories...

And they started walking again, through the trees, keeping to the little dirt pathway that they could barely see, they could barely see at all. The light had helped, true, she wasn't stumbling in the dark, but it hadn't helped enough. The other boys and girls were shadows, wraiths, bobbing along the trail, their black school robes identical and their washed-out faces indistinguishable. Was that Avery, up ahead? Were Wilkes and Rosier next to him? "Yeah, that's Avery." She had forgotten that Lestrange had been walking behind her, even with his hand on her shoulder. He was almost silent, maybe he wasn't breathing, maybe the reason he was so odd was that he was a zombie...could zombies read minds? "I know it's Avery!" He was getting on her nerves, and her voice sounded angrier than she had intended. He was quiet after that, anyway, maybe she had frightened him a little, or at least reminded him of what she could do if she lost her temper. That was a good thing, really, that he suspected what she was capable of. He would respect her. She intended for them to be friends. It might be rather hard to be friends with a blood-drenched, mutilated corpse. The pigeons...they had all died...some of them had taken hours to die.  
They were at the side of the lake now, and Hogwarts was on the other side. Were they expected to swim? Wilkes and Rosier wandered over to stand closer to Bellatrix and Lestrange, leaving Avery to contend with a group of chattering girls. Good luck, Avery. Why had they bothered? Bellatrix wasn't going to swim across the lake with them, nobody could swim that far, she wasn't going to try--then she saw the boats. There was a little fleet of them (she counted eleven), bobbing up and down on feeble waves, each of them large enough for several people. Were they expected to go across in these?  
"C'mon, get in, get in, four to a boat, c'mon now..." The man called Hagrid was ushering the first years into the boats, gently enough, with a bit of an air of desperation in his voice. Children could be so hard to control. One of them was prodding the lake with her wand. Bellatrix longed to knock it out of her hand and watch her face as it sank. Too bad that she was standing so far away. It was time to get into the boats, anyway, Rosier and Wilkes and Lestrange had saved a seat for her on one of the nearest ones. Poor, poor Avery was stuck with three of the giggling girls. Bellatrix mentally stored his expression...so funny.  
The boat quivered a little as she got in, the hem of her robes dipping momentarily into the water. Rosier scooted over to make room for her, gathering his robes off the seat to ensure that she was comfortable. They respected her. That was nice. She was almost comfortable when the boat suddenly took off.

Bellatrix had been on boats before, of course, who hadn't? She was used to things being propelled by magic, too. It was the size of the boats that made her nervous. Four to a boat, a boat she could barely lie down in, with sides rising six inches off the benches. You could fall out of a boat like that easily. The lake must be fifty feet deep, you would drown, you would be food for the fishes, and nobody would know you were down there. Rosier was looking nervous, too. She shoved him playfully, and he squealed. Wilkes rolled his eyes, but Bellatrix noticed that he, too, was looking a little pale. Lestrange seemed perfectly at home on the boat. He was trailing his hand in the water, his face supremely unconcerned. She kicked him. He ignored it. She had to work hard to restrain herself from pulling out her wand, and...

She didn't let her relief show when they got off the boats onto the rocky little underground beach. Hagrid had to help some unfortunate boy off his boat. It wasn't her, of course, or any of her dear new friends, they would never do something like that. Well, perhaps Avery would, but she never would. The boy was holding everyone up. Leave him, let's go, we're wasting time. It didn't improve her mood in the slightest when the boy nearly fell in.  
They followed Hagrid and his lamp, up through a tunnel, out in front of Hogwarts. The castle was larger than it had looked, she was an ant at the foot of it, an ant that could be stepped on, if Hogwarts the giant moved too quickly. She was being silly. Castles didn't move. She wasn't an ant. It was time to put away childish fantasies like that. She was a Hogwarts girl now.  
There was a pigeon on one of the buttresses, ten, twenty, fifty feet into the air. It was looking at her, she was sure of it, it was giving her a rather nasty look with its little red eye. Little red eyes could be popped. They could be poked out. There were pigeons at Hogwarts, stupid gullible pigeons, pigeons that didn't know about her yet. They would know. They would learn.  
Hagrid knocked on the door they were all clustered around. It didn't creak when it swung open. House-elves, they had to have house-elves to polish and scrub and oil the hinges.  
She was standing at the back of the group, where she couldn't quite see who Hagrid was talking to, even when she stood on tiptoe and peered over the heads of her fellows. It was a witch, a witch with a Scottish accent and a businesslike edge to her voice. A teacher? Another servant?  
"I'll take them in, Hagrid. You should go down to the feast, it just started." Hagrid bowed to her--Bellatrix could see a glimpse of her, a tall, middle-aged witch with black hair, over his shoulder--and went in, leaving the first years behind. Good riddance.

They went in with the witch. Bellatrix's first impression of the entrance hall was...light. Light and warmth and noise. The ceiling stretched far higher than she could see, massive and imposing, like a cathedral ceiling, and the staircase could easily have held a hundred students. The other first years were gasping and oohing and ahhing--Bellatrix was silent. But, nevertheless, she smiled, and her black eyes almost gleamed. Before she could take it all in, they were out of the hall and into a much smaller, duller room. The witch gestured for them to sit down. Bellatrix remained resolutely standing, until Wilkes grabbed the hem of her robes and pulled her down. She almost missed the woman's first words, distracted by quietly beating Wilkes up.  
"Welcome to Hogwarts. In five minutes you will be taking part in our Sorting Ceremony..." and that was when Bellatrix stopped listening. Oh, yes, the Sorting. She knew about that. Everyone knew about that. Her father had graduated from Hogwarts when she was five, and he had told her everything while it was all fresh in his mind. You tried on a hat. That was all. That was nothing. She had grown up dreaming of trying on that hat, hearing it shout "Slytherin" to the world, announcing her proper place in the Wizarding world. And here it was, and it was anticlimactic. No drama, no tears, nothing interesting at all. What a dreadful letdown.

The witch finished talking and swept out. Bellatrix waited. They all waited. There was a fly buzzing in one of the corners of the room, a little black fly zooming around in circles. Bellatrix longed to swat it. Her hand was shaking a little from the effort of resisting. The pigeons were back in her mind...it was a hard habit to break.  
She hit the girl next to her, hard, across the face. The girl shrieked, falling away from her like a sack of flour, twisting back up like a snake. Bellatrix hadn't hit her very hard, and yet there was a nice bruise on her cheek, black on brown, framed by shiny black hair. Like Bellatrix's hair, but in pigtails. Pigtails. A sure sign of a lowly family.  
"You hit me." Disbelief. Astonishment. Well, of course, of course dear Bella hit you. Doesn't the bruise prove that? How hard is it to figure out what happened? Poor girl. Slow of mind, clearly, we must pity such people. But hitting her, it had felt so good.  
"Oh yes, I did, didn't I?" Bellatrix tried to stop herself laughing. No good. The girl looked offended, that was good, another little human toy for her to play with when she got bored. Poor girl, her life at Hogwarts would be ruined.  
"I'm telling Professor McGonagall!" Who was McGonagall? The witch who had been talking to them, most likely. How wonderful, Bella might get a detention and waste a few nights. She took out her anger on her new chew toy's face. The girl got up and moved over to the other side of the room.  
"Nice." Was Lestrange being sarcastic? No, he wasn't, his broad, handsome face was sincere, he really meant it. He was a puzzle, hard to read, hard to anger, an annoyance, a friend. They shared a hobby. He was looking at the bruise with the eyes of a connoisseur, a master of the art. She imagined what young Rabastan might look like, and what he might look like with a bleeding lip, a black eye, a burned hand...it was a nice image. Maybe she would ask, later, if they got some time alone. He could probably tell her stories. And she could tell him stories. Andromeda, sprawled on the landing, unconscious, she must have tripped, Bellatrix had sworn she hadn't been anywhere near, and they'd believed her, you didn't just fall down three flights of stairs, but of course, she had, Bellatrix was innocent, there was no evidence at all that Andromeda had been pushed. She might have died. What sort of heartless monster would have PUSHED her? And Cousin Sirius had sworn she had hit him in the eye, twice, three times, and put a hot poker to his hands, but Sirius liked to make up lies. And Regulus was too young, too scared to say anything, even when they found the cuts...Narcissa was never hurt. Nobody would dare touch Narcissa, nobody would mess up that sweet annoying perfection, she was such a little angel. Nobody would dare. Even Bellatrix knew Narcissa was off-limits. Bellatrix herself, of course, was never hurt. And yet they didn't suspect. People were stupid, like pigeons, they didn't understand at all.  
Lestrange would understand.  
"Isn't it"  
"Always." He fell silent as McGonagall came back in, and the girl Bellatrix had slapped had a quick word with her, and McGonagall turned and gave Bellatrix a look that would curdle milk. She was in deep trouble. Avery and Rosier and Wilkes all looked over at her, their faces full of relief that they weren't in her place, and Lestrange tried to give her hand a quick reassuring squeeze. She pulled her hand away just in time. He was so...tender, he had taken such a liking to her. They had only just met. It was odd. She didn't think about it too much, though, they were all getting up and going somewhere else. Fuzzy memories of her father, of cocoa, of late nights and fascinating recollections. They would go into the Great Hall next. To be Sorted.  
She felt that there should be music somewhere. Beethoven, maybe. Something dramatic. It was a dramatic moment, wasn't it?

All of the older students' eyes were fixed on the first years as they walked in, pale-faced, single file. The first years themselves were, to a man, staring at the hat in front of them. It was a pathetic, ravaged old thing, patched and dirty and ancient, nearly falling off its little stool. Bellatrix wasn't sure she wanted to allow it on her head. What would they do if she resisted?  
It took her a moment to register it, it was so absurd. The hat was singing. Who in their right mind would enchant a hat to sing? She tried her best to ignore it, but the singing forced its way into her mind over all her mental blocks. It should burn, the stupid, happy, inane thing should burn.  
The hat fell silent. A few of the students laughed, most (including the girl Bellatrix had hit earlier) clapped. Rosier, a few students ahead of her, couldn't seem to decide whether to roll his eyes, clap, or do both at once. Nobody was taking this seriously. They should be taking it seriously. This was an important ceremony, and they were laughing. Be serious. Be serious. Can't you be serious? The pigeons...they never shut up, either. People either amused or angered Bellatrix, on the whole, with nothing much governing which it was. At that moment, she was furious. Her rage faded quickly, however, when Professor McGonagall pulled a list of students out of her pocket and started calling out names.  
"Arkleton, William!" One of the boys stumbled out of the line, collapsed onto the stool, and dropped the hat over his ears.  
"RAVENCLAW!" Applause. Arkleton sat down at one of the tables, the one that had been cheering, of course, who cheered for Ravenclaws but the Ravenclaws themselves?  
"Avery, Jonathan!" Avery tried to strut over to the hat, but something went wrong and he looked merely idiotic.  
"SLYTHERIN!" A different table applauded this time. Bellatrix scrutinized their faces, trying to see some mark of difference, of greatness, but there was nothing. Of course, she wasn't standing so close to them, probably she would see it when she got closer. There had to be something.  
More students were Sorted. Bellatrix continued staring at the Slytherins. By that point, some of them were staring back. Avery gave her a little wave. She didn't acknowledge it. Any minute now McGonagall would call her name...go on, it was an easy enough name.  
"Black, Bellatrix!" Oh Merlin. Slytherin, please, let it be Slytherin. But of course, it had to be Slytherin, it was inconceivable that it would be otherwise. She was going to make her family proud, of course. She would be sorted into Slytherin.  
She held her breath as she strode up to the stool, and with as much dignity as possible, she put on the hat. She caught it before it went over her eyes, relaxing suddenly. Why was she so nervous? She was being stupid...

She expected a little voice. She got one. Such a little voice, though, a childish voice, the sort of thing Dumbledore would add. Was Dumbledore looking at her? Was he watching? Everyone would be watching.  
"Oh. Oh, my. SLYTHERIN!" It hadn't taken any time at all. She was in Slytherin. The house of her ancestors. Everything would be all right. She was drafting a letter home in her mind by the time she got to the Slytherin table, sliding into the seat next to Avery, her fellows' cheers ringing in her brain. This was good, this was right, this was how it was supposed to be. More students were sorted. The line shrank by degrees.  
"Jenkins, Herbert"  
"GRYFFINDOR!" The Gryffindor table exploded in idiotic cheers.  
"Lestrange, Rodolphus!" Lestrange looked completely unconcerned, the hat sliding over his eyes. Bellatrix could have sworn he had grinned at her.  
"SLYTHERIN!" Yes, yes, that was good, they would be together. "Paternoster, Abby!" It was the girl Bellatrix had hit in the face.  
"HUFFLEPUFF!" Well, of course, that was the chew-toy house, wasn't it? Oh, they would meet again. And again.  
"Prewett, Fabian!" He had a funny look to him, as if he was held together by rubber bands. People like that were asking for it.  
"GRYFFINDOR!" She wasn't surprised.  
"Quidley, Nathan"  
"HUFFLEPUFF!" Jenkins looked disappointed. Not that Bellatrix was looking, of course.  
"Rosier, Evan!" Rosier gave them a little wave as he strolled over to the hat and plunked it on his hairsprayed blonde mane.  
"SLYTHERIN!" She was paying more attention to the Slytherins, of course she was, the only names that she bothered to remember or even to notice. And Rosier was one of them, not that she'd hoped that he would be, of course, but it would be nice if the five of them from the train were all Slytherins.  
"Skeeter, Rita"  
"SLYTHERIN!" An unattractive girl, orange-haired, wearing high heels. Bellatrix cringed inwardly.  
"Turkle, Findlay!" What a dreadful name, really.  
"RAVENCLAW!" "Wilkes, Edmund!" The last of the five. Avery crossed his fingers, and Rosier held his breath, and even Lestrange looked interested.  
"SLYTHERIN!" She hadn't realized she had been so tense until it was over and she slumped onto Lestrange's shoulder like a sack of flour. It had been a tiring night, full of emotion and drama. A hot bath, that was what she needed. And a few pigeons.

**A/N: Hope you enjoyed that. I apologize for blatantly skipping over the Sorting Hat song. I tried writing one, but I'm no poet, and in the end it was so ludicrous I decided to write around it. I hope it didn't come across as too much of a cop-out.**

**Don't ask about the names. Mainly, I wanted to give someone the name Findlay Turkle. Anyway, I only did 12 students, some of whom had canon names--if I run out of students to use as minor characters, I'll use one of the ones I didn't bother naming or giving a house. There are around 40 first years, so.  
Yes, yes, I know that Rita Skeeter is canonically blonde. I highly suspect it's a dyejob. And yes, she is canonically around Bellatrix's age, assuming she didn't lie in the Prophet. (Bella would have been forty-three or forty-four in GoF. On the other hand, I decided to mess with the timeline a bit so Bella and the others are a few years younger--explanation below.)**

**Yes, I'm playing with the timeline on this one. I know I said I would try to keep it canon-ish--I do, in fact, have some logic for this decision. Firstly, on the Black Family Tree, Bellatrix is listed as having been born in 1951, and Rowling has stated that Snape was born in '59 or thereabouts. Secondly, Bellatrix and Snape are mentioned by Sirius as having been members of the same gang, which implies that their school years overlapped by at least one year. (Alternately, Bellatrix could have been a founding member, who left before Snape arrived at school, but other members overlapped. However, the way Sirius said it made it sound rather like they had been at school at the same time, so...yeah.) Thirdly, Rowling has made some math errors in other portions of the books (for instance, Marcus Flint remaining at Hogwarts for a year too long, which was later retconned), although never major ones. Lacking any other evidence, I prefer to interpret the inconsistency as Rowling making a mistake. So, yeah...also, before you lot ask, I hadn't thought about this much when I wrote All In The Family, which has Bellatrix and Rodolphus being born around 1951. (pants) Wow...I really AM a Harry Potter geek. (grins)**

**Next Chapter: Bellatrix gets to know Hogwarts, takes a Relaxing Bath, and meets her new roomies.**

**And now drumroll Answering the reviews!  
Sienna Rhiannon Chase: What do you think I'm doing? :P kirameru1701: Drunken strip poker! Yes, there will be more poker later on. Rich wizards like poker. Actually, that would be a good idea for a collab.  
ILoveRodolphusLestrange: Dante is a reference to the poet Dante. No idea what it means--the idea that Rodolphus's middle name is (unfittingly enough) Dante came from a very old fanfiction that will never be posted because it, frankly, was pretty bad. So...yeah.  
tarak795: Well...um...I never did figure out exactly what happened to the pigeons. I guess they sort of...exploded? Don't worry, I have a nice, bloody death planned for Abby Paternoster, although it's pretty far in the future. PM me if you want to chat :) That goes for everyone else, too. I don't bite :P Although I think Bella does.  
FaerieEpona: Why, thank you! Yeah, they're probably my favorite characters. Bella is pure pwnage.**

**As always, please review! Or I'll find out what happened to the pigeons by testing it out on you :P**


	4. Act Four: The Supporting Cast

**Disclaimer: If I was J.K. Rowling, I would be able to think of a better disclaimer. I would also be rich. And famous. And talented. None of which I am.  
A/N: Hello there, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Act Four, hope you enjoy the show--(dodges rotten tomatoes) All right! All right! I'm sorry I took so long to update! (Rodolphus and Bellatrix drag Slytherite, kicking and screaming, offstage) You haven't heard the end of this!**

**(crickets chirp) (audience starts to get up and leave) (Rosier and Wilkes come out onstage and address audience)**

**Rosier: We're quite sorry about this, really, we are.  
Wilkes: It's not OUR fault.  
Rosier: Miss Slytherite's writing machine was broken.  
Wilkes: (eye roll) It still is, Evan. She's got two of them.  
Rosier: She has? Really? Then why didn't she think of using the other one before this?  
Wilkes: She's stupid.  
Rosier: And she's kind of lazy.  
(Slytherite gets away from Roddy and Bella (the escape was quite daring and involved three Sickles, Avery, and a Murtlap), beats up Rosier and Wilkes in a rather comical fashion, and resumes narrating her own author's note.) Yeah, that pretty much covers it. I'm planning to update at least once a week from now on, assuming Real Life doesn't decide to screw that up.**

**Also, I noticed that uploading the previous three chapters gave them a few formatting goofs (paragraph breaks disappearing, punctuation being removed, etc.), which I didn't notice before I posted them. If I have enough spare time, maybe I'll go through and fix them sometime. All future chapters will be examined and formatting will be repaired before I post them, to avoid any future confusion along those lines.**

**Now that all those pesky Real Life concerns are taken care of, we can get to the interesting part. Aren't you the lucky ones.**

**The Plot So Far: Bellatrix goes to Hogwarts, makes friends (sort of), makes enemies of teenage!Umbridge and Abby "Chew Toy" Paternoster, and gets sorted into Slytherin. Yes, yes, I KNOW everyone and their uncle has done that plot! Mine is distinguished by...a theatrical twist to the author's note, frequent mood whiplash, and a great deal of cruelty to the common pigeon. Hey, it's SOMETHING.**

**In This Chapter: A lot of delicious chow is consumed, Bellatrix and Rodolphus contemplate ripping off Umbridge's head, sundry new characters are introduced, Rita Skeeter's canonical hair color is implied to be from a bottle, and my curiosity about where the students take baths is satisfied.**

**Warnings: Fictional imaginary violence, fictional real violence, fictional discussion of violence, overuse of surnames, some confusion as to whether or not you can be friends with someone after knowing them for all of six hours and occasionally beating them up, bad writing in general, and a gratuitous fictional bath.**

**(watches audience leave in annoyance with overly long author's notes)**

The feast had barely started, Dumbledore had barely made his speech that nobody had bothered to listen to, when Bellatrix started longing to get away. There were chattering students all around her, piling food onto their plates as if they hadn't eaten for months, learning names and making introductions and babbling about the stupidest, most inconsequential things. People could be so annoying, didn't they have some sense of dignity, of propriety, couldn't they just act as if they had brains in their heads? Children, that was what they were, eleven years old and still little children. Everyone was stupid. She wanted to get away so much.  
"Bella?" That was the third time. He was so...intimate with her, after a day, as if he already knew everything there was to know about her. But he didn't, he never would. Thoughts about what someone might do to him someday, the sort of thoughts she knew you weren't supposed to have about your friends, flashed through her mind, softening her anger. She wouldn't hurt him...he couldn't help being slow.  
"What is it NOW?"  
"It's Toad Face. Down the table." How did he know--had he been reading her mind--she had never called Toad Face that out loud, had she? Had she? Oh, no, she had, hadn't she, while they were playing poker...She followed his gaze down to the end of the Slytherin table, hoping he was wrong, hoping that the stupid toad wasn't one of them. And there she was, sipping her pumpkin juice ever so daintily, her curly brown hair and shiny pink headband looking almost like mold. An idea formed itself in Bellatrix's mind. She could run down...to the end of the table...and Toad Face's throat was so exposed...blood, blood on Bellatrix's hands, blood staining the tablecloth red. She could do it...Lestrange and Avery and Rosier and Wilkes could all watch. They could take the seventh-year girls sitting with Toad Face. Rosier could have the blonde, there was only one blonde in the group and Rosier was blond too, it would be so perfectly matched. Avery was a whiner, a baby, he wouldn't want to really fight, and Wilkes was so puny, they could share the redhead. And Lestrange.  
"You can have the one with the braids, the one who looks like one of Cissy's dolls--" He looked blank. For a moment, she almost thought that he didn't understand what she was thinking, where her thoughts had led, but no, he did understand, it was only a minor point he missed.  
"Cissy?"  
"Narcissa. My sister--you have a brother, don't you?" He almost smiled, his eyes going misty and faraway.  
"Yeah. Yeah...Rabastan wanted to come. He's really little, he said he could stow away in my trunk, but Grandmother wouldn't let him. Too bad. He could've done my homework for me." Bellatrix giggled. There was something comforting about knowing that Lestrange had a family, it almost made him more human, less of a mystery. They were friends already, they would be close friends, she almost liked him, irritating as he was. After one day, she almost liked him. It was worrying, maybe she was going soft already, maybe the light and food and company were wearing down her defenses. Or maybe they would marry and have eleven children, the sort of thing Narcissa might predict, the sort of thing her family might want. She was in Slytherin, wasn't she, wasn't that enough? They wouldn't be lovers.  
"If they could have fit into my trunk, my adoring parents and the rest of my wonderful family might have come, and it would be lovely and happy and sickeningly sweet and--"

Avery broke up the conversation by waving his hand between their eyes.  
"Do you mind not flirting in front of us?" And of course, of course, he'd thought that there might be something romantic, after ONE day, between them, everyone might think that, denying it would just convince them of it further. Anything she said would be held against her...nothing she could do. Avery's face, bloody and mangled, swam into the space behind her eyes where her thoughts were so clear. Her hand swung out of its own accord, burying itself into his stomach, up into his ribs. The dazed look in his eyes was enough of a reward.  
"I'm telling Professor Slughorn!" Oh, yes, Slughorn worked here, didn't he. The Blacks had had him over for supper occasionally, he was daft but harmless, Avery could tell tales about her all he wanted, she had charmed Slughorn with a little demonstration the last time he had been over. She had had Kreacher catch a box of spiders especially for the occasion, he had watched wide-eyed as she showed him what she could do. He was head of Slytherin House, wasn't he? Yes, he was, he would be like her father while they were there. She could see him up at the high table, he wasn't hard to miss, with that stupid walrus face. And Avery was going to tell him what she had done.  
Lestrange barely seemed to move at all, his hand whipping from the table to Avery's wrist. If Bellatrix had blinked, she would have missed it, such a subtle little thing. But his hand was on Avery's wrist, gripping tighter and tighter as Avery whimpered and whined. Wilkes and Rosier were watching, even though they tried to hide it, watching with perverse interest on their faces. Bellatrix imagined the delicate bones cracking, pointed shards sticking through his skin, blood raining down onto the floor and pooling under the table, and Avery, his eyes bulging out of their sockets, going limp and falling. Such sweet thoughts, such a nice little fantasy.  
Of course, she wouldn't have let it happen in real life, Avery was her friend, friends didn't do that sort of thing to one another no matter how much they longed to. She twisted onto her feet, moving closer to Avery until he shuddered, pressing her wand to his chest. Rosier took a deep and very audible breath, Wilkes prodded him and stared at Bellatrix, and Lestrange just watched them expectantly. The tone of her voice made them all shudder, even more than the words, aggressive with a sick, sisterly tinge to it. Even Bellatrix wondered what part of her it had come from.  
"Jonathan," he winced as she used his first name,"you aren't going to tell Slughorn, or anyone. You aren't. Or it'll be a broken wrist, a burned chest, anything that we can do. Understand?"  
"Y-yeah." Lestrange dropped Avery's wrist as soon as he squeaked out his answer. "That was a dirty trick."  
"She plays to win," Wilkes agreed. Bellatrix let her face relax into a gracious smile.  
"You really should know that by now." Rosier remained silent. She was sure he was thinking about her, he couldn't NOT be. His big blue eyes were out of focus, and his lips were quivering a little. The perfect portrait of the upper-class fop, all blonde curls and pretty face and nothing behind the eyes. Like a porcelain doll, like Narcissa. She was RELATED to this idiot. Sickening. "What ARE you thinking, Rosier?" He started, his eyes flicking over to her face.  
"Nothing much, I'm just tired. The prefects are lining up the first years, by the way, did you notice?" No, she hadn't, she hadn't paid attention. It was time to leave. Toad Face and a nondescript boy were drawing the Slytherin first years toward them--the orange-haired Skeeter girl, Avery, a few that she couldn't place. She joined them, and they walked...

...through a door, down through a maze of stone passages, left, right, right, left, forward, past a group of Hufflepuffs, Toad Face blithering as they went.  
"My name is Dolores Umbridge, and I am a seventh year, and a prefect..." Bellatrix stopped listening. What more could she say that they wouldn't know? Her name, they knew that now, in the dormitory and with teachers she would be Dolores, but inside Bellatrix's mind where the bloody thoughts lived, she would be.  
"Toad Face." Umbridge turned to face her, looking shocked, her face going pale in the torchlight.  
"What? What did you say, Bellatrix?" They had stopped walking; the other first years went quiet. "She knows her already," one of them muttered. Wilkes silenced her with a look--Bellatrix was grateful for that, she would thank him later, he already knew whose side he was on.  
"Nothing that might interest you. But you should know, toad." She was proud enough of the words, they were good words, biting and intelligent, she would be remembered for saying that to a prefect. Even a prefect who so obviously deserved whatever she got, the other students must hate her, everyone who saw her would think the same thing. And Bella had scored a point, hadn't she? Umbridge had gone whiter than chalk, her ugly flabby face twisting into a parody of a smile.  
"That is your second offense tonight, at the very least. I shall ask Professor Slughorn if any others have been reported." Paternoster. They wanted to punish her for striking Paternoster, didn't they? Stupid, stupid, stupid worthless people thinking they had any right to control her with their stupid little punishments and their slaps on the wrist. "If your poor behavior continues, I will be forced to report you, and if at all possible I shall ask about detention. Now come along." Oh Merlin, they tried so hard. It was so pathetic it was funny.

They were silent the rest of the way to the dormitory. Avery, who had threatened to report her himself at most five minutes ago, caught her eye once, and mouthed "Nice one". The hatred Umbridge inspired was that strong. How in the name of Merlin had the girl gotten to be prefect? Who would be intimidated by her? The most she did was threaten, threats were meaningless if you never intended to carry them out. Lost in her reverie, Bellatrix nearly walked into a torch when they stopped suddenly, facing a blank wall. Something magically concealed, then?  
"Acromantula." Umbridge's voice had lost some of its indignant tone, instead dry and businesslike. A door slid open, a sliver of the Slytherin common room visible beyond it. Bellatrix caught a glimpse of greenish light and stone walls before Umbridge moved in front of the door, turning to face them. "Now, in a minute you will enter the room where you will spend much of your time while here at Hogwarts. Before we go in, I would like to make a few ground rules quite clear. Boys are not allowed in the girls' dormitories, without exceptions. Sexual contact is forbidden, as are indecent exposure or conversation. There is to be no interfering with the fire--if you wish to call home via fireplace, contact me or another prefect and we will make arrangements for a conversation, moderated by a prefect, of course. First years are not allowed out of the dormitories after nine, for any reason. Vandalizing the dormitory--for instance, carving the walls--is absolutely forbidden. There are two lavatories in the dungeons (take a left, another left, and a right), which we share with Hufflepuff. Towels are provided." Yes, a hot bath, that was what she needed to relax. A hot bath, alone with her thoughts, where she could close her eyes and watch the pigeons burn all over again. Comforted by the thought, she followed Umbridge through the door.  
The common room was nice enough, she supposed, softly lit and furnished all in green, with rough stone walls and seven doors on either side of the room. The silent male prefect took the boys through one door, and the girls were left with toad-faced Umbridge to show them to their room. One of the older girls caught Bellatrix's eye, turned to her friend, and giggled. Bellatrix gave her a withering look, and she fell silent, although a smile was still flitting around the corners of her mouth. It was a relief to get into the room and away from her.

The first year girls' dormitory was not what Bellatrix had expected. It was trapezoid-shaped, the walls built of some dark green, glittering stone. The ebony beds were inlaid with something that looked like silver, two beds against the wall with the door and three opposite, their sheets emerald green silk. Their trunks were lying next to the beds and labeled with slips of parchment--Bellatrix had the bed to the left of the door. One of the beds had a sleek silver cat curled up on it (cats grated across her nerves). A single, silver chandelier hung from the ceiling. It wasn't a bad room, on the whole, elegant and majestic and practical enough. She would live here for nine months out of the next seven years, sleeping in this bed and working by the light of this chandelier and living with these girls. The girls might be a problem, all of them with something to prove, of course, all of them in constant competition. Well, she would have to watch her back. She could do that, could she not?

One by one, they introduced themselves, sitting on their beds and staring nervously into each other's faces, looking for some hint of weakness, something there to destroy, or maybe all but Bellatrix had let down their guard. Sometimes it was so hard to tell if people were honest or liars, stupid or playing games.  
"Okay, I'll start." A beautiful girl with a strawberry-blonde braid and hazel eyes and freckles across her dainty nose. Slytherin House was known for the blood purity of its members, and blood purity often went hand in hand with stunning good looks, which were diluted almost at once when a member married a Muggle or a Mudblood. Bellatrix had read books on the subject. So the girl was probably a pure-blood. Easy enough. "I'm Juliet Coughlin." The name was unfamiliar. The girl had a slight Irish accent--perhaps she was from an old Irish family? Yes, that made sense. "My favorite color is lavender, my favorite flower is also lavender, and I've never ridden a broom." The girl with the bed opposite Bellatrix's, tall, plump, and brunette, frowned, her thin eyebrows drawing together with...what? Doubt? Confusion? People could be so hard to read.  
"Blood status?" Juliet's face fell. Bellatrix's heart sank.  
"Half-blood. But," she added hopefully, "my mother is from an old family! That counts, doesn't it? And I'm a nice person, really, I am!" The other girl smirked unpleasantly, her eyes meeting Bellatrix's and betraying her thoughts--'commoner, she isn't worthy of us.' Bellatrix wholeheartedly agreed. The brunette spoke next. "Evelyn Burke. Pure-blood, like the name isn't obvious enough. My great-uncle runs Borgin and Burke's, the cat is mine and her name's Magister-Smith, and," she gestured to the girl next to her, a shy-looking little waif whose brown hair probably outweighed her, "this is my niece, Agatha Jugson. Don't mess with her, she's more dangerous than she looks." Agatha looked up briefly, waved, and glanced away again. Bellatrix took the opportunity to slip her wand out of her pocket and fire sparks across the room at her. They fizzled out halfway, leaving faint ashy marks on the stone floor. Everyone looked at Bellatrix. It was her cue to speak.  
"My name is Bellatrix Black. You've heard of my family, I don't doubt." She was carefully choosing her words to fit the impression she wanted to create, and it was working. They looked impressed already. "I don't have an owl at present, my parents told me they would send me the family owl every week so that I could write home, but I wouldn't be getting my own owl until I could prove I had a boy friend to write to over holidays. The usual practice." Evelyn rolled her eyes.  
"Not in OUR family." Anger immediately flooded Bellatrix's mind, breaking through all pretense of politeness. How dare she condescend? To someone whose family was better, more respected, than hers?  
"Oh, well, yes, I suppose your family has abandoned the traditions?" Evelyn's face turned the color of coalesced blood. Bellatrix knew the color, of course, from pigeons, pigeons she had caught and held down and splattered on the doorstep. She could feel herself itching to do it again, to render Evelyn a bloody mess. But she couldn't. Word would get out. She might be sent to Azkaban. Her family would be shamed for generations.  
"You made that one up!" Evelyn and Bellatrix were both on their feet by this time, glaring into each other's eyes, wands in their hands. Juliet glanced ineffectually from one to the other, her breath shallow. Agatha was rummaging through her trunk. The one girl who hadn't yet spoken, Skeeter or whatever her name was, was listening intently. Bellatrix turned on her.  
"What? What are you--what's so--GAH!" It was at that point that her fury hit its peak, strangling her and burning her and cutting off the rest of her words. She had been inching closer to losing her temper all day, her patience had slowly worn away, one little incident had finally pushed her over the edge, igniting her rage in an instant, and it was all she could do at that moment to keep from strangling Skeeter--or Rita, yes, that was her first name, it was Rita. Not that she needed to know. Her hands, her hands should be around Rita's throat, they should be, her face was burning, and she was gone, storming out of the dormitory, startling a few students in the common room as she went.

She was halfway to the bathroom before she realized she had forgotten her shampoo. She would make do with soap, she wasn't going back in there, she wasn't going to face them and give in and hurt them and be thrown out of school. She would resist. She had to. No matter how hard it was. Or her family would be shamed, she would be imprisoned, she would never be able to finish the great task she had chosen to take on. And that would be tragic.  
The bathroom the Slytherin and Hufflepuff girls shared was noteworthy in several ways. First, it was built almost entirely of smooth gray stone tiles, with exceptions only for the toilets, mirrors, the soft fluffy white towels stacked in a corner, and the candles in niches in the wall. Second, there was a door next to the sinks that led into a small room with a bathtub sunk into the floor. Third, by an odd coincidence, when Bellatrix pushed open the door of the bathtub, she discovered that Abby Paternoster was already occupying it.

**A/N: Wow, a cliffhanger! Admittedly, a rather silly one, but still. Where's my dramatic music, dammit? (cheery pop music begins playing) (facepalm) Never mind. (Actually, I split it here because it looked like a convenient stopping point, and I noticed that each chapter has been progressively longer. Wanted to do something about that.)**

**The bit about blood purity and good looks, as well as the bit about the Blacks being a better family than the Burkes, was invented by Bellatrix. And actually doesn't make that much sense if you think about it. If anything, with that much inbreeding in the "good" families, I never managed to figure out how Sirius and Bellatrix and Narcissa were all so good-looking. Maybe they had iguanas every few generations and just quietly tried to pretend it never happened. I dunno. Or maybe they just marry off the cute ones, never mind that they're utterly and completely mad?  
That actually makes some sense. In a weird kind of way.**

**I got the idea for Juliet from reading one too many bad fanfictions. If you don't recognize the character type I'm parodying, be thankful, mkay?**

**Next Chapter: Confrontations in the Bathroom are Dramatic!**

**(reads through reviews) And now...Review Answering Time! (cheery pop music starts up again) Will somebody please turn that off? Thank you.  
Sienna Rhiannon Chase: Sadistic-ness is indeed wonderful, no? Yes. It is.  
kirameru1701: Paternoster was, after all, created specifically because Bella needed someone to pick on. She's the chew toy. And yes, Sorting Hat songs are a pig. A pink fuzzy pig that oinks and rolls in mud. Which kinda ruins the mood.  
Sheograph: No, you don't want to know. Believe me. (Pigeons!) It's better not to know...things that Man was not meant to know. Things that Insane Preteen Girl was not meant to know, but apparently does. Things that hats were not meant to know, although pretty much EVERYTHING goes under that category. So...yeah.  
tarak795: (writes down idea) Wow, we have a chapter idea! I was planning to do the occasional chapters from someone else's point of view, y'know, Voldy, Rodolphus, Narcissa, et cetera. And now a pigeon. If anyone has any chapter ideas, feel free to send them in! (thinks about bloody deaths) Well, currently several characters are already marked for death, although most of them will be dying when the war heats up near the end.**

**Reviews will be rewarded with fluffy white towels and an uninterrupted bath. And, of course, popcorn.**

(edited because I forgot to answer the reviews. Stupid me.)


	5. Act Five: Sweet Sick Fantasies

**Disclaimer: Your shoelaces are untied. I bear no responsibility if you don't tie them and trip, smash your head open, and have to pay expensive medical bills. A/N: Hi--(Slytherite is, once again, dragged away by Rodolphus. Canonical-46-year-old-psychotic-fugitive-Bellatrix picks up the microphone)  
"I assure you, it gives me NO pleasure whatsoever to have to explain such things to you plebeians, you muck on the boots of the world, you--"(Voldemort, from offstage, hisses "Just do it, Bella!". Bellatrix blushes and continues.) "However, I suppose I must, for it is what the Dark Lord commands, even though my humble mind is incapable of comprehending why. When I finish, all of you will be mine, to do with what I wish. Make out your wills now, say goodbye to your lovers." (She laughs maniacally.) "Speaking of lovers. Roddy dear? You had something to say to the boys and girls, didn't you?" (Rodolphus, abandoning the bound-and-gagged Slytherite, comes out on stage and joins Bellatrix)  
"Yeah. Yeah, I did." (Bellatrix looks at him expectantly. He stares back at her. Finally, she rolls her eyes and hisses, "And?") "Mmkay, this chapter"  
"ACT!"  
"Abby Turkle--"  
"PATERNOSTER!"  
"Right. Paternoster. Anyway, she's naked for about half of it. Not like we care. Or anything. I mean, she dies. Later on. In chapter forty-two or something. And she's not as pretty as Bella. Nobody really is. Not like my Bella. And she dies, dammit. And--" (He becomes aware that Bellatrix has wandered away out of boredom, exasperation, and lust for Voldy.) "Something. Not like it's important. I mean, she dies. And she isn't pretty even when she's dead. Not like I'm into that kind of thing. Dead people. You perverts." (He wanders off, looking rather dazed. Slytherite re-enters, rubbing her wrists where the ropes cut into them.) Sorry about that. Probably best not to let the blood-drenched loonies narrate from now on. (I think Roddy hasn't been taking his medication.) So...yeah. Fanservice warning, although it's quite mild. (If you people start shipping Bellatrix/Abby, I will hide under my bed, gibber, and not write any new chapters for a month.)**

**The Plot So Far: On her first night at Hogwarts, Bellatrix establishes a fragile friendship-in-name-only with Avery, Rosier, Rodolphus, and Wilkes, meets the other Slytherin girls (Juliet, Rita, Agatha, and Evelyn), argues with them and storms out of the dormitory, decides that a nice hot bath would be a good way to relax, and discovers that Abby is already in the bath. Ooh, an idiotic cliffhanger!**

**In This Chapter: Baths are taken, Bellatrix is unpleasant to Abby, Bellatrix's sadistic fantasies hit a speed bump, the pseudo-romantic tension between Rodolphus and Bellatrix is played up even more, there is quite a bit of foreshadowing, and a grand time is had by all. Except for Abby.**

She didn't look. It would be shameful. She was above such things, such filthy-minded things. But Paternoster screamed.  
"What are you--get out--oh my God!" There would be rumors. Things would be said. Bellatrix's eyes slid open of their own accord. Paternoster wasn't in the bath yet, not quite naked, still in her underclothes. They had red spots. Red. On white. Spots. On a brassiere. She stared as if she had never seen one before, her mind shocked, detached, blank. Things might be said. What was she doing? Why was she still standing there? Shouldn't she have left as soon as she realized her mistake?  
Oh Merlin. She was still there, staring, her hands hanging loosely at her sides, her eyes fixed on Paternoster's breasts. It was far, far too much. Humiliating, yes, it was humiliating. A decent young lady wouldn't do such a thing. A decent young lady would have fled the room long ago, begging for forgiveness, almost crying with shame. It dawned on her that she was feeling nothing of the sort. Nothing at all. It was an odd situation, yes, in some academic way an indecent one, one she wouldn't have chosen to put herself in. There could be no doubt about that. But she didn't care too terribly much. Paternoster was humiliated. Paternoster's round brown face was flushed, her eyes averted, her hands folded over her body. It was the expected reaction, wasn't it? But still...so ABSURD...you had to laugh, really, you did. The stupidity of it. Being embarrassed by something like that? How utterly HUMAN.  
"Merlin...you have...you're wearing..." She paused to try to stifle her laughter. "Who wears something like that? Who, honestly? Who does, Paternoster?" She expected Paternoster to break into tears. Bellatrix was good, very good at what she did. She could take someone apart in seconds, if they weren't expecting it. She could blow their clever facades apart the way she killed the pigeons. And Paternoster didn't cry. She didn't. She just glared. Oh, she was angry, but she wasn't down yet. But Bellatrix wasn't angry any more, not in the slightest, this was her game, this was something she knew, the way she entertained herself on long nights. She had learned every one of little Andromeda's neuroses, she could play her like a piano. And if that didn't work, there was always physical force...she wasn't angry. She was having far too much fun.  
"Stop. Just stop picking on me, Bellatrix. I-I don't want to have to report you." Almost the same thing Umbridge had said. Did they all take it out of books? Were they too scared, too puzzled, in too much mental uproar to think of something better? Or were they all just stupid and unimaginative? Stupid, they WERE all stupid, the minute one intelligent person came along they were all of a dither. She could use that. It meant they might respect her when the bruises faded.  
"Report me. Squeal to all the lovely kind teachers. I won't stop you, will I? I'll just wait. And then, Paternoster, later..." Paternoster looked away again, to hide her tears, her upper lip visibly trembling. Bellatrix pressed her advantage a little bit farther, stepping further into the room, towering over the crouching Paternoster, smiling like a cat playing with a bird, a pigeon, whose wings it had already ripped off.  
"Please stop being so mean to me." Check and mate. Paternoster's voice was empty, flat, and Bellatrix knew she had won. Saying anything more wouldn't change things, it would be just a formality, they both knew it. There was really no need to hurt her anymore, was there? She would obey Bellatrix from now on, she would avoid her if she could, she knew she was beaten, didn't she? Saying anything else would be petty. It would be cruel. There was so much perverse pleasure in that.  
"Stop deserving it." Paternoster's face went blank. Her hands shaking like a frail old woman's, she silently put her robes back on, put up her perky black pigtails, and left, shrinking apologetically as she passed Bellatrix. Beaten. Broken. Pigeon. She would be Bellatrix's new pigeon. And she would break again and again, every night for seven years, until there was nothing left to break but a shell. And then that would shatter too.

Imagine it. So beautiful. Bellatrix pulled off her robes, using one foot to turn on the silver tap, glancing offhandedly at her reflection in the mirror. There was a thin red line on her left cheekbone, from one of the trees on the way to Hogwarts, no doubt, raw and tender and oddly beautiful against her skin. She ran a finger over it, letting herself notice every little detail, the heat and numbness as she pressed her finger into it, the dull tingling ache as she pulled it away, the tiny droplets of blood that bubbled up as she drew her fingernail across the scratch. It hurt, oh yes, but she didn't let herself recoil, it was the work of a second, really, to master the pain, let someone like Paternoster have the tears and the weakness. Paternoster would cry, she would cry and she would beg, there would be slashes improving her delicate porcelain doll face, the trouble with porcelain was that it smashed so easily.

Imagine Paternoster as a doll, blank-faced, unknowing, beautiful and mindless. Imagine her cold inhuman flesh, imagine snapping her fragile fingers one by one, bloodless, boneless, offering no resistance, imagine rubbing the paint off her dull stupid smile until her face fades away leaving nothing but the knowledge that it was there in the first place. And then fling her to the floor, watch her shatter into a million pieces, with no blood, no guts, nothing but porcelain all the way through, far too beautiful and clean to be human, and then pick up the shard that used to be her smile, and see that she has no soul, no mind, no meaning to her existence. It was all a colossal mistake. She should never have been created in the first place, dolled up and painted like a real person, and now they see the forgery that she was all along.

Like Narcissa. Bellatrix's eyes flickered open suddenly, she was jolted out of her happy fantasy world, the thought was a disturbing intrusion into something that had been so smooth and so sweet. It was stupid, though, Narcissa had a soul, she wasn't a doll, she was fully human. Paternoster wasn't, she had to be a Mudblood, the clumsy way she had put her robes on made that obvious enough, she was hardly as human as Narcissa, was she? As alive? Magic and the soul, they were connected, were they not? And Narcissa was a pureblood...she was thinking nonsense. Better not to drive herself insane with meaningless babble. The bathtub was almost overflowing...she turned off the tap, sliding into the water, wincing at the heat. Closing her eyes. Trying to bring those pleasant fantasies back into her head. But it was no good, was it, she couldn't bring herself back to that happy place, thinking of Narcissa had ruined everything, made her fantasies seem sick and twisted. But they weren't, really. They just didn't...didn't need to involve sweet little Narcissa. Sweet, innocent, pure little Narcissa, the picture of naivete, virtue, saintliness, who nobody would dare touch...she was off-limits. But Paternoster was fair game, wasn't she? Paternoster, who cowered and groveled like a puppy that had just been kicked...

Oh, it was no use, she couldn't get the thoughts back. There was no point trying. She finished her bath quickly, only running her damp hands through her hair once or twice in a token effort. It hadn't helped, it hadn't done a thing, she could feel it, she was as tense and angry as she had been before, what a waste of time. She dressed just as quickly, turning to leave, and...caught a flicker of motion out of the corner of her eye. She wasn't seeing things, no, there was something, wasn't there...A fly was buzzing around the corner of the room, circling and swooping and dipping. It looked addled, insane, deluded, as if flying in circles would eventually get it somewhere. Why not put it out of its misery...would it know it was about to die? Could flies feel fear? Bellatrix wasn't sure. Smiling, the tension and worry in her mind draining away, she raised her wand. There was a spark, and then a cloud of acrid smoke...

It was quite late when she got back to the Slytherin dormitory. The green lights were dimmed, most of the students had gone to bed. There was a fifth year couple talking quietly in one of the corners, but they took no notice of her, and in turn she ignored them. There were only two other people, both of whom she recognized at once.  
"Bella." Lestrange was slumped in one of the arm chairs, looking for all the world as if he had been sitting there staring at the door, waiting for her. He really was obsessed, wasn't he?  
"Don't call me that." He nodded as if he had been expecting it.  
"Agatha wanted to talk to you." Bellatrix's eyes flickered to the waif in pajamas sitting next to him. Agatha Jugson was smiling uncertainly, innocently, her cute childish face free of malice or dishonesty. Lestrange was resting his arm casually on her shoulder, like an elder brother might do to his beloved little sister. She had obviously taken to him already, and the warm smile he was giving her was completely genuine. Probably she was some sort of replacement in his mind for Rabastan, like a replacement goldfish, satisfying his needs to protect and adore and cherish like a puppy. It was almost funny.  
"Did she now?" Agatha's face brightened, the shyness disappearing.  
"Miss Black? Evelyn isn't angry with you any more, Miss Black. Rodolphus and I talked her out of it, he says you were really nice to him on the way here and I think you were both just tired. You were just tired, right?" Bellatrix glared at her. Just tired? So she hadn't meant what she said, had she? Oh, no, it had all been a colossal mistake...idiots. She could have handled that herself, oh yes. Did they really think she needed their help? She was eleven years old...not a child...it was so PATRONIZING of them...but they had, after all, meant well. And they might have kept her out of detention, as if she couldn't serve, as if she was ashamed of what she had said and wanted to take it back or at least to avoid any punishment. They thought they had meant well, hadn't they?  
"Oh. Well...thank you for that. And next time, don't lie." They nodded, looking unsurprised by the thought that there would be a next time. Willing to bail her out of whatever she got herself into. What nice people. What a nice tool to have. "Oh, and...goodnight, Lestrange"  
"Call me Rodolphus."  
"No. Not now." He looked hurt for a second, then nodded.  
"Okay. 'Night, Bella, Agatha." Agatha smiled, hopping out of the chair.  
"Goodnight, Rodolphus. Sweet dreams." Merlin.

The girls' dormitory was dark when they walked in. Juliet and Rita were snoring. (Juliet was squeezing a toy unicorn with a blank, vapid smile.) In minutes, Agatha had joined them, curled up at the foot of her bed. Bellatrix had changed into her pajamas and climbed into bed before she realized that Evelyn was lying awake, staring up at the ceiling.  
"You're back."  
"You sound so shocked."  
"Where'd you go?"  
"Oh, I defended the bath from Mudbloods, swatted a few flies, and put up with your adorable little cousin. All in a day's work. Why?" Evelyn was silent for a moment before she answered.  
"...Sorry."  
"What?"  
"About what I said. Sorry. I don't hate your family."  
"I'd have to kill you if you did." The flippant tone surprised even Bellatrix. It wasn't a joke...she meant it.  
"Truce?"  
"Checkmate."  
"What?"  
"Nothing."

Evelyn was silent after that, leaving Bellatrix alone with her thoughts.  
...it would be Narcissa's first night without her. Poor little Narcissa, with only Andromeda to take care of her, without her Bella to protect her. How depressing...  
...Lestrange was obsessed with her, wasn't he? What did he want? He was so...intent on her...she didn't need a right-hand man, did she? But she liked him, that was the irritating thing...  
...the fly had burned...like Paternoster would burn...she would beg for mercy...oh, poor girl, your life is ruined...imagine holding her hand in a fire until she screamed.  
Bellatrix smiled as she drifted off to sleep. It had been a wonderful, wonderful night...

**A/N: You know, I've had dreams that seem perfectly fine, up until someone's head blows up or Santa Claus starts tap-dancing naked or something, and I wake up with a vague feeling that my brain has just been violated.**

**The very thought of Bellatrix/Abby, I think, would qualify as brain violation. Err...no. Just no.  
RodolphusxAgatha might be kind of cute, though.**

**This chapter was, amazingly, the first thing I planned. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, all of the brilliant writing you have seen so far was a lead-up to Bellatrix and Abby fighting in a bathroom.  
That's kind of sad.**

**Next Chapter: E.T. Phone Home! (Or something.)**

**Review Answer Hotline:  
Sheograph: You know, if I had some rock-hard willpower, I would be able to update more frequently. You should air-mail me some of that :P**

**Reviews will be rewarded with popcorn, as always. Failure to review will be punished in a creative fashion involving Bellatrix, a walrus, and three pieces of broccoli.**


	6. Act Six: Dear Narcissa

**Disclaimer: (teacher voice) Now, class? We're going to do logic today. Here's an easy example. J.K. Rowling, and only J.K. Rowling, owns Harry Potter. I am not J. K. Rowling. Therefore?  
A/N: Hellosngsnglasdhto#NHIHnsifhiqhry24ewr39-  
THIS LAPTOP HAS BEEN CONQUERED IN THE NAME OF THE DARKu9y924yih4903j4yr-  
Sorry about that. It looks like Bellatrix found out how to operate a keyboard. It's a never-ending battle, I tell you.**

**The Plot So Far: Bellatrix goes to Hogwarts, meets people, blah blah blah, and incidentally sets herself up for a detention.**

**In This Chapter: Bellatrix suffers through said detention. And writes a letter to eight-year-old!Narcissa whenever Filch isn't looking. And becomes increasingly paranoid that he is, indeed, looking.**

**Anyway, since everyone and their uncle has written a "first few days at Hogwarts" fic and there wasn't a whole lot that hadn't been said already, I decided to skip over the first week and tell it in summary. This also has something to do with the fact that the first night took up five bloody chapters. Basically, whenever something would take too long to narrate, I'm putting it in a letter.**

**If you don't like this device, feel free to complain. Complaints will be handled by eight-year-old!Rabastan. We pay him in sugary sweets and Red Bull.**

**Enjoy the Y(Q#OK09I#3YQ0Rhqa;OWUR--**

**this keyboard is the property of rabastan virgil lestrange!!111**

_Dear Narcissa..._

Bellatrix's eyes flickered to Filch. No. He wasn't looking. She was safe, wasn't she, she was too clever for him.

She wrote a few more lines on the other sheet of parchment, just to be safe. So he wouldn't suspect her. She had thought it all out.

_I must not hit my classmates.  
I must not hit my classmates.  
I must not..._

Back to the letter, shifting slightly in her seat to block his view of what she was doing. The candlelight was feeble, he was sitting barely five feet away and she could hardly see him. He couldn't possibly see what she was writing, could he? No, he couldn't, there was no way...write it now, while he wasn't looking...

_Dear Narcissa,_

_I've missed you..._

Was he looking up? Was he? She couldn't see him without moving, could she, but if she moved would it look suspicious? He had no reason to suspect her. Who would write a letter home during detention? Who would be so audacious? Bellatrix, would, of course, but he didn't know that yet. Or did he? Did they ask your parents about you? Did they know everything about you before you set foot in Hogwarts? And she hadn't known this, hadn't prepared, had been utterly helplessly ignorant while they watched and learned and remembered...But no, that was overdoing it a little. They wouldn't need to know that. They'd had time to watch her for a week, they might know her by now. But she hadn't had a reason to pull this trick before...They wouldn't know yet, would they? So Filch wouldn't be watching her. She was safe, for the next few minutes at least she was safe, she could go on defying him without fear of consequence. It was a nice feeling, knowing that.

_Dear Narcissa,_

_I've missed you more than I can say. Getting the letter from you this morning was such a relief. It feels like it's been more than a week, doesn't it?_

_Hogwarts is nice enough. I don't doubt that you would like it here. I was sorted into Slytherin, of course. Did you really expect anything else from me?_

_Slughorn, you remember him, of course, is our Head of House, which I suppose is good. He teaches Potions, too, and he likes me a lot. (The other teachers, not so much, but they don't know me very well yet. I'm sure I can change their minds in time.) He recognized me immediately when I walked into the classroom for the first time. My friends were with me, he recognized them too, of course, they're all from good families. You don't think I would bother being friends with someone who WASN'T pureblood? But they are._

_Ask Mother about her family, will you? She has a cousin named Evan, doesn't she? He's one of my classmates. A nice enough person, I suppose, but naive, overly trusting, and none too bright. How do parents let their children grow up so innocent, Cissy? It makes me sick to think about it.  
And then there's Wilkes (first name Edmund). A cynic to the end, he is. Irritable. Easily angered. Always looking for the worst. People like that are just as bad, Cissy. Remember that. They don't enjoy life at all...it's so sad for them. They waste their lives, always complaining, never changing anything, never making the world a better place. And you CAN make the world a better place. There are people, Narcissa, born for the job, clearing away the filth and leading society back to a better world. Remember that.  
Avery doesn't believe me, though. (First name Jonathan.) He wouldn't. He's a whiner, a coward, working for himself and himself alone. Don't ask me why I bother with him, I don't care to explain. (No, it has nothing to do with love! Don't even think that)  
And Lestrange..._

He was looking. She could feel it. She knew he knew. Oh Merlin. But then, if he could see her face, did that mean he knew she knew he knew? So if she looked up, that would prove his suspicions...but if she kept writing, she would look a fool for not knowing he was watching...or maybe he wasn't watching, and just liked her to think he was? Merlin's beard. She wasn't made for this, this wasn't what she had been born for, plotting and paranoia and constant subterfuge. Her way was far, far more direct. Imagine him bound and gagged by candlelight while she finished her letter. Imagine him begging her for mercy and swearing not to tell. But she couldn't...she didn't dare...she would be thrown out of Hogwarts. It wasn't worth it. No. It wouldn't be worth it, giving up her chance at everything for a few moments of pleasure. Finish the plan...just finish it, get through it somehow, and then throw out subterfuge and swear never to do this again. But first, finish the game, play it through to the end...

Switch. Keep your head down and your quill to the paper.

_I must not hit my classmates.  
I must not hit my classmates.  
I must not hit my classmates..._

Stop. Listen. Switch. Don't let him see.

_And Lestrange is something else entirely._

Something she didn't know how to deal with. No. Don't say that to Narcissa, don't mention the way he holds doors open for you and carries your books and acts like a perfect gentleman to you and you alone...don't give her reasons to suspect anything untoward...

_...something else entirely. Calm, loyal, blunt, and just a little eccentric...he likes me, though, so that's good. Useful, I mean.  
And I suppose there are the girls too. Not nearly as interesting, I'm afraid, Narcissa. We don't have much in common. But I think you'd like Agatha. She's so sweet._

_You mentioned Father's meeting in your letter. He does do that, doesn't he? Don't you wonder what he's doing? If he has another one, tell me everything._

Narcissa would be a good sister. She would tell her Bella everything. There was no reason, no sane reason, that she needed to know about the meetings...it was curiosity, that was all. They seemed important. And Mother had been evasive when she asked, told her it wasn't the sort of thing for little girls to think about.  
Mother could get stuffed.

_Say hello to Kreacher for me.  
Your loving sister,  
Bellatrix_

Switch. Write a few more lines, seventy-three more to go. And if he's guessed, he can get stuffed too.

_I must not hit my classmates..._

If Narcissa could see Bellatrix sitting there writing meaningless lines, what would she think? Nothing good.

_I must not hit my classmates..._

When she finished and handed it in, he looked at it as if he was trying to find some error, some line she had missed. Nothing. "Well, you certainly took your time, missy, didn't you?" It took so much effort to stop herself reaching for her wand, and--

Lestrange was waiting for her outside Filch's office. There was a letter in his hand. What a coincidence.  
"Bella." There was nothing stopping her from hitting him, was there? He didn't even flinch, of course, the idiot.  
"How many times? Don't. Call me. Bella." He nodded.  
"Next time I'll remember. You want to walk up to the Owlery with me?" Why...why was he asking her? Had he been waiting just to ask her? "I asked Jonathan, but he said he had to finish his Charms work, and Evan and Edmund were off somewhere. So...you want to?" Embarrassing, saying yes. But she had a letter to mail, didn't she?  
"...all right. I have a letter too, you know, or else I wouldn't say yes." He smiled. She grimaced.  
"Good enough."

If Narcissa had seen them, she might have spread some rather inconvenient rumors.

**A/N: LOLOLOLOL rodolphus leiks bellatrix ZOMGLOLOLOLOL w00t w00t w00t w0H92q932704oj--**

**Sorry about that. I think I have to reconsider my employee decisions.**

**Or at least stop paying Rab in pure undistilled caffeine.**

**Review or I'll untie him and sic him on you.**

**Next Chapter: Rodolphus Leiks Bellatrix!**

**Review Answer Hotline: Sienna Rhiannon Chase: Well, Minerva's around Voldy's age. (They do, indeed, have their shippers.) So unless she failed her finals spectacularly and repeatedly, on the whole, I think not. As it happens, by my calculations, she started teaching in approximately the (somewhat vague) year that this is all taking place. So yeah. The hate/homicidal desires/etc., however, can totally be accomodated. Bella makes enemies easily.  
tarak795: Wow, I've always wanted my own Bellatrix. Life is a wonderful thing, ya know? So is insanity.**

**Review, or else. (looks meaningfully at bound-and-gagged!hyperactive kid!Rabastan)**


	7. Act Seven: Scions of the Best

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, okay? Are the lawyers happy now? I do suspect that I effectively own Rab, though, considering how little I pay him.  
A/N: Hi. I have my half-mad prettyboy (cough) office boy going around collecting tickets, so if you see a kid in a dress hopped up on caffeine rummaging through your wallet, somebody please whack him with something.**

**This chapter is going to be from Rodolphus's point of view, so the style, narration, whatnot will all be different. (Slightly) less melodramatic. Less ominous. Less purple. No less insane.**

**...no, you can't skip it, it contains vital character development, dammit!**

**Also, I've noticed a continuity error. In the second chapter, Narcissa is briefly mentioned as being seven. Later on, she's eight. Take it as a sign of Bella being utterly mad and unable to accurately remember. (I'm going to go with eight.)**

**The Plot So Far: Bellatrix and Rodolphus both have letters to mail, in a rather contrived coincidence. Rodolphus attempts to turn it into a date. Bellatrix, with great effort, manages to refrain from vomiting all over her nice clean robes.**

**In This Chapter: New readers become firmly convinced that they're reading a romance. Many of them abandon it in disgust. Other readers lap it up, abandoning the story when they realize that it ISN'T, fundamentally, a romance. Or at least not a very romantic romance. (Love at first punch?) Although Rodolphus might disagree. Also, there is a backstory infodump. Yes, it WILL be relevant later. (How dare you suggest that I came up with a lot of unneeded backstory for Rodolphus and Rabastan and then was so proud of it I just HAD to use it somewhere? That's not what happened at all!)**

**Warnings for this chapter include insanity, convoluted backstory involving brother-sister incest, brief mentions of violence, a very twisted narrator (Rodolphus is undoubtedly intelligent, philosophical, physically attractive, and affectionate. He's also a violent, amoral psychotic with the conscience of a teabag.), extreme length, pigeon death, and first-person narration.**

**Share and enjoy.**

They say there's no such thing as love at first sight. Or at least Rabastan says that. Like he would know. He's EIGHT.

He's wrong, anyway. There is such a thing.

She's so pretty. Smart, too, and a decent witch. Almost out of my league, as they say. But it's all good. She likes me. Tries to hide it, but she does. When she hit me on the train, she held back once or twice, didn't leave any bruises that lasted more than a few days. We run into each other all the time, don't we? It's almost like she's following me. Wherever she is, I'm there with her. We sit together in class with Jonathan and Edmund and Evan, but they aren't that important. They're just there for decoration. Really it's just me and her. And yesterday when she was getting her books out of her bag, she touched my hand for a few seconds. It looked like an accident, but I don't think it was. I think she wanted to tell me something, but she was too proud to say it to my face. It's all right. I can wait. I wanted to ask her about it during class, but she told me to shut up so she could listen to McGonagall talk about whatever, and when I asked her again a few minutes later she got McGonagall's attention and I got lines. She's pretty serious about her education, I guess. Almost too serious. Like she wants to be Minister or something. I asked her if she wanted to be Minister a few days ago, actually. She just looked at me for a minute, and then she said,  
"The Ministry? You think I'd be suited to the Ministry of Magic?" And then she laughed. I like her laugh. It's so pretty. "Lestrange, they're a bunch of incompetents. My uncle's been trying to get rid of them for years. No, I won't be their Minister...", and then she went on to talking about her uncle, who, I guess, is not the best man for the job of reforming the country. Actually, I think she thinks he's kind of stupid and...what was the word she used? Frivolous. She's so serious when it comes to changing the world. I don't think she's really like that, though. I think it's a front to impress people, get them to listen to her, all that. She's not as good an actress as she thinks she is. They might be fooled, but I'm not...she's like me, really. She enjoys the power she has over people, controlling them, making them hurt. She likes it, it's a game to her. The best game in the world. Like chess, if you have a queen and two rooks and two bishops and your opponent has only the one king. And they know they've lost, and you can see the humiliation and anger in their eyes. She likes that. I've watched her with Jonathan, with Evan (she leaves Edmund mostly alone), with that stupid Hufflepuff girl. They all respect her, or they fear her, if there's any difference. She doesn't even have to use any force, the way she did with me. But then, we have something special, so I shouldn't be surprised. She can do whatever she likes to me. Or to Rabastan, I guess, if she ever meets him.  
I think she'd like Rabastan. He's so...innocent. Cute, almost. Sweet, fragile, brilliant, sensitive, volatile, annoying, sickly, effeminate, and beautiful. Beautiful. The way the blood contrasts with his pale skin, the way the bruise on his shoulder didn't heal for a month, the look in his freaky mismatched eyes when I tell him what I want to do to him. Pain, fear, anger, betrayal, forgiveness. Always forgiveness, in the end. He's like the heroine of some tragic opera. Dramatic. Beautiful. Sad. Suffering so nobly, all so the audience can watch her pain and find it beautiful. He never says anything to Father, or to Grandmother or Grandfather. He likes me too much for that. If he told, I would be punished...I might be tortured or killed for what I do to him. But he never tells anyone. Because he wouldn't want me to suffer. It would hurt him, it would break his mind. And I would never let anyone hurt him. I care about him too much. But Bella is a special case.  
Interesting how one person can be the center of your life, you can live only for them, and when someone else comes along and turns your head you'd betray them in a minute, you'd sell them, you'd kill them if you had to, just for the chance to spend a single minute with that new person. I'm sorry, Rabastan...but you don't matter much anymore. It's not your approval I'm living for, I won't give up my life just to see you smile.  
Bella can hurt me all she likes. Emotionally, mentally, physically if she wants to. I'll never say a word against her. Because she's Bella. And I love her. If I told her I love her, she might hurt me. She might make my life hell. But I'll endure that for her. I don't care if she won't admit that she loves me. No matter how much she hurts me, I'll still love her. If she slit my throat right now, with my last breath, I'd apologize for putting her to the trouble and bleeding on her robes and ruining the letter she was going to send. Because I love her enough to endure anything for her. When we're seventeen, we'll marry. She'll have my children, and we'll raise them together. And I'll be by her side every minute of every day, forever. We'll die together, and be buried in the same grave...and if she dies first...

Look at her. She's beautiful.  
"Bella?" Strong, too, and good at fighting. I'm going to have a black eye. She doesn't hit anyone ELSE when they call her Bella--oh, she makes it plain she doesn't like it, but doesn't hit them. Hits me all the time. If she wasn't uncomfortable with someone, someone she liked, using a pet name for her, she wouldn't bother...well, she has to have her pride, doesn't she? But to me, she's Bella.  
Besides, she looks so adorable when she's angry. I don't care if she says she hates me. I know she doesn't really.  
"Lestrange, do you see those stairs?" She's smiling, pointing to the staircase down to the first floor, but her eyes are furious. Vindictive. The love of pain.  
"Yeah...?"  
"Are you really stupid enough to think that I'd hesitate to push you?" She expects me to say no, flinch, apologize like mad. But it's just one staircase. I'll do anything to prove to her that I adore her. The staircase is right behind us. Be a nice little dramatic gesture, like something from an opera or something. No, I don't like pain, who does? But doing something sweet and stupid and romantic for Bella, that's worth it. And if I get hurt, she'll like that...it's a game, really. It's all a game to me. And her too, of course.  
I step in front of the staircase. Wait for a second. She doesn't push me. Now she's smiling like a cat, her left hand on her hip and her right hand flat against my chest. Is that a gesture of affection? Condescension?  
"...you're not going to do it?"  
"No. Not now," she says, sounding less threatening than before. "I wouldn't give you the satisfaction." I smile at her.  
"Thanks, Bella." She doesn't push me now, either. But she buries her fingers in my shoulder, still smiling. Weird smile. If Rabastan were here, he'd run away screaming. Actually, he'd probably do that if her fingers were in his shoulder. I've done that to him before. It hurts.

After a minute, she lets go, still smiling in that weird way, like she's planning to drag me off and kill me, and we keep walking. She's more talkative now, friendlier. Guess I've passed some sort of esoteric test that makes sense only to her. It's like opera. The temperamental heroine who won't admit to her feelings, the masochistic love-struck hero who puts up with it all and enjoys it, and the scene where they finally admit to their love in a touching duet. And then they die. The end. Or maybe it's a comic opera, where the hero gives as good as he gets, the duets are filled with witty banter, and love triumphs over all. Or maybe part of both. Life is melodrama, when you think about it. So many people around you are raging and loving and dying senselessly, and you know you'll be next, and you just don't care. Because you would do it. You would lose your mind and yourself and everything you ever were, and you WOULD die for love.  
"So. The letter. Who's it for?" Her smile fades for a second, and then returns, sweeter and softer and no longer for me.  
"Narcissa. My sister Narcissa. I told you about her, did I not?" No, you didn't.  
"Her name. You mentioned her name. Nothing else, though."  
"Oh, I see. I tell you about her pretty dollies, which I HAVE told you about, Lestrange, even if you're too dull to remember, and you still can't guess what kind of little girl she is?" It takes me a minute to realize that she's called me stupid again. True, I'm no intellectual. Rabastan calls me apathetic, hedonistic, amoral, blah blah blah, guilty as charged. And I live in my own mind most of the time. But I'm not stupid. Maybe she is. Maybe she's not what I've been thinking. Maybe she's just a sadistic little girl with a pretty face.  
"The evil kind? Like you?" And I'm calm again, the pain and the fury and the lust to destroy leaching out of my mind. These rages come and go in a second, simmering and boiling over and going back to whatever well of resentment and suppressed anger they come from. Long enough for me to get my hands around her throat. My hands are around her throat. She's said worse to me before. And I've never hurt her, had all the opportunities in the world for a week, never have, don't think I ever will again. The shock and anger in her face is enough of a lesson on keeping my temper under control.  
"Don't you DARE ever touch me again!" Her skin is so soft and warm. I can feel the muscles in her neck, tense from anger and violation and...surprise? I don't want to take my hands off her. She's trembling with indignation. Her flesh and blood and bone feel so good against my hands.  
I let go. She's breathing hard, eyes fixed on mine, pretty face twisted. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. "...Bella..." She doesn't even notice that I used her nickname. That's a bad sign, isn't it? "I'm so sorry..." She scowls at me, drawing her wand and pressing it to my throat.  
"You hurt me, I can't forgive you, not yet--!" Her voice rises sharply, melodramatically, and sparks shoot out of the end of her wand. Don't think it was intentional--her eyes widen, surprised, and then she smiles. "NOW I can forgive you. And I have. And we won't speak of it anymore, will we?" No. No, we won't. She's being so kind to me. Poor messed-up Rodolphus, not quite right in the head, loyal and docile and occasionally stark raving mad. That's what Father thinks, I heard him telling his woman friend, trying to impress her. Probably what Bella thinks, or what she pretends to think, because I KNOW she likes me. She doesn't pity me at all. She knows we're equals. But she has to pretend to, of course, she has her pride. I can live with that.  
"No. We won't." We walk quietly for a minute. She runs her hand across her throat, checking for damage. If I could take that back, I would. But it's over now, isn't it? She won't hold a grudge against me for snapping just once? No. "...what's Narcissa like, then? What sort of little girl is she?" She avoids my gaze, her expression unpleasant.  
"She's an innocent, Lestrange. Naive. Sweet, fragile, sensitive, delicate, angelic, and beautiful, more's the pity. Oh, she's MORAL enough, I can't fault her there, and she understands her place in society and acts accordingly. She's a very good person, Lestrange. An utter angel." I listen for sarcasm, but she's being serious. "But...she's stupid. Incompetent. She knows the rules, she plays by them, but she doesn't UNDERSTAND...take marriage as an example. There are a million reasons for marriage. Senseless, lascivious passion for some no-doubt-he's-charming rake is near the bottom of the list." She sounds far older than eleven. I know I don't talk that way, I don't think that way. Who cares about the rules of society? "Children, social standing, politics," she glances briefly at me, "sometimes political assassination, marriage makes that easier, too, and the need to carry on the traditions of Wizarding society. Not love. As a matter of fact, love gets in the way, it complicates things, there's no happily ever after. But that's what she expects, that's what she doesn't know that she's never going to get..." Bella pauses, stops walking, staring at the tapestry in front of us. "We're going in circles." She turns and starts walking back down the hallway. I follow her, trying to make sense of what she said.  
"You've thought about these things?" She laughs bitterly.  
"Oh, really it's all nonsense, I'm parroting my grandmother almost to the word. Mother made it very clear what Grandmother said to her when she got married. Mother herself doesn't agree too terribly much...but then, she's a dunce like Narcissa." That sounds more like Bella. "They're all stupid, I don't know HOW they produced me"  
"Now you sound like Rabastan. Or Father. Or maybe both. Ironic, that." She looks puzzled, oh, of course she does. I never explained that to her, did I? "Why? Why is it ironic?", she asks, looking genuinely confused.  
And so I lay out the train wreck of our family tree for her.

"Basically it's something like this. Back when Grandfather, Rabastan II (my brother is Rabastan III), was a few years older than I am now, his father died unexpectedly. His mother said at the time that she WAS pregnant when her husband died, but her descendants generally understand that she was not, and that Lucienne was fathered by an unknown. "  
"So was this 'unknown' a pureblood, Lestrange? Or do you not even KNOW?" "Well, we were quite sure, yes," I tell her, "but if I tell you any more you might freak and not want any more to do with me." She doesn't ask me again, and I continue with the little family drama.  
"Two decades later, Lucienne and Rabastan...well, due to an oversight in the Wizarding laws of the time, they...well, they married. Legally it was annulled as soon as someone had time to look at the paperwork, but they, half-siblings, yes, continue to live as husband and wife to this day." Yeah, I KNOW, okay? Bella looks sick for a minute, and then bursts out laughing. "It's not so uncommon in the old Wizarding families, just considered a bit sick nowadays," I tell her, "I don't like it any more than you do." She hits me, laughing, not really angry or even upset, just playfully disgusted.  
"Oh, you're a liar, Lestrange, and a freak and a filthy child of incest, we should all put you down right now!"  
"Yeah, well, the way I look at it, it's only a little worse than cousins, right? Bet your family's got some of that in it." She goes quiet, nodding. Cousins aren't so bad, it's just siblings that people say is disgusting. I don't understand it. "And they had a son. Aldebaran the first (and last, most likely). My father. Stop looking at me like that, Bella, the man's fine. Bit stupid, but okay in theory. Now, the guy was an idiot. Still is. When he was at Hogwarts, he met this girl, rich, pretty, naive, big dreams, thought she'd change the world"  
"Like Narcissa," Bella says. Or like you, I don't say, because I know the comparison'd make her furious.  
Anyway, thing is, he also met this boy, brilliant, powerful, knew he'd change the world, blah blah blah. And Father got into some sort of alliance with him, don't know the details, I heard all this from Grandmother and she didn't know the full story either, really. Somewhere along the line, anyway, he had to choose between them for whatever reason, and he picked the girl and got married. The man, wish I knew his name, Father calls him the Dark Lord when he mentions him at all, wasn't too happy about being abandoned for a woman, though, and after Father and Mother got married he dragged Father back to work for him--"  
"He should never have chosen her in the first place," Bella says. "He deserved whatever he got." I can't answer that honestly, half because I think I'd do the same.  
"Yeah, maybe he did. Anyway, Grindelwald was defeated when Father was a teenager..."  
"Lestrange," she says, looking exasperated, "I KNOW about Grindelwald. Everyone knows about Grindelwald. It's your own ignorance that leads you to think that you have some sort of elite knowledge."  
"I do." She goes quiet, stops walking, turns to face me more directly. I feel pleased, proud even, for a moment, but it's not me she's in awe of, it's my family and the things they've done. "Grandfather and Grandmother worked for Grindelwald before his capture. They were two of his nearest and dearest in Britain, and they were never arrested...so yeah, Bella," she scowls at me but says nothing, "I have some elite knowledge." She stares. I can feel myself blushing. Merlin's pants, I sound like an idiot, I don't usually talk this much, she must think I've cracked.  
Finally, she takes pity on me. "I see. Now, why have you brought it up? A chance to brag? Or does it, perchance, have something to do with...anything, really"  
"Yeah. It does. Grandfather and Grandmother found out, see. They weren't keen on the new man, the Dark Lord, trying to take power so soon. And he was taking power, Bella"  
"Lestrange, I know about the Dark Lord, my father works for him, he mentions him sometimes. Always, always assume I know more than you do..." She trails off, smiling. Yeah, she's probably right. "Well? Go on."  
"Anyway, they didn't want their son working for him, they were still loyal to Grindelwald even though he'd failed, and the Dark Lord was doing so well. Is. Doing well, I mean. But you know that. And they didn't like Mother much, Grandmother says she was deluded and maybe a little dangerous to start with, and then when Father went back to the Dark Lord...she went mad, and when she had her first child..." It's odd talking about my sister. I can't really be sad for her, because I never knew her and anyway most of the time it's like she never existed, but if I had known her... "I had a sister, once. But...Bella, she didn't live, Bella, Rabastan doesn't even know she existed. And if she'd lived..." I don't start crying, like I'm sure she expected, but my voice goes up almost an octave, I have a deep voice for my age but for a minute I sound like Rabastan, and Bella doesn't look sympathetic on the outside but she doesn't complain about me calling her Bella and I think I see a little bit of sympathy in her eyes.  
"So you had a sister, and she died when she was a baby. Don't get so upset about it, that's just pathetic, most families have lost a child, and if your mother's as bad as you say she is, it's only to be expected, isn't it? Did your father know?" She's right, I should get over it, I'm acting like a child.  
"Yeah, of course he did. And he somehow talked the Dark Lord into giving him a break so he could make sure his next heir survived, which was me, and then four years later Rabastan was born, and that was the end of that, because...Mother never really recovered from our sister, and she got really weak and when Rabastan was born she...I don't remember her much. I don't really care, tell the truth."  
She smirks at me like she doesn't believe me, but it's true. All I remember is this waif with big green eyes who talked to herself a lot. Calligara Lestrange, 1927-1955. Nice legacy. "Father did, though, he blamed Rabastan, they don't get on very well. And he started drinking, and bringing home women, and he never really went back to working for the Dark Lord." Bella looks scandalized. "I actually overheard Grandfather and Grandmother wondering whether or not to, well, poison him and blame one of his mistresses. He never remarried, but he keeps talking about marrying both of us off as soon as we're old enough to...to produce heirs for him."  
Bella rolls her eyes, smirking again and walking a little faster.  
"I knew there was a perfectly unreasonable explanation for why you're following me around like a lovestruck puppy." Almost can't speak. My heart feels like it just crashed through my ribs.  
"No! Bella, that's not it at all! I don't give a--I don't care what he wants! Come back here!" We're almost to the Owlery, and she could easily just run to the door, slam it in my face, and hold it closed, but she actually slows down a little, turning to look at me again, grinning, looking more carefree and playful than I've ever seen her.  
"You idiot, I didn't mean that at all. Unless Daddy's given you a few complexes...your family sounds normal enough, really. Mother's said almost the same things to me. Oh, we're scions of the greatest, Lestrange (and I don't understand why you won't call me by my surname, the Blacks are a perfectly respectable family, you know), upholding our family traditions, and surrounded by idiots to boot. Think of Rosier! My mother is a Rosier by birth, her whole family's like that, fops and twits and the idle rich. Oh, we're all scarred by upbringing, it's the burden of society, one of them anyway. Think of Narcissa!" She laughs, her face brightening. I've unlocked some floodgate in her mind. "What about dear scarred Mother herself?"  
"What's your mother like?" Her smile twists momentarily into something rather disturbing.  
"Oh, I'll tell you later. She's not a subject for polite conversation, is she? When we know each other a little better, then I'll tell you, see if you scream. Come on, let's get our letters sent, or don't you have an owl?" I still don't understand her sudden happiness, but I follow her into the Owlery, hoping she'll explain.

As soon as I walk in, my vision fills with owls. Big owls, small owls, white, gray, brown, perched everywhere in the room. Rabia could be anywhere. Bella, of course, has already found hers, or at least her family's, a little gray one that sticks out its leg right away. When it takes off, she comes over to me and playfully jabs me in the eye with her finger.  
"Bella! Stop that!" She looks sulky for a minute but stops. As soon as she does, I feel bad for telling her off, but my eye still hurts enough to keep me from feeling too sorry for her. "Help me look for my owl, will you?" She rolls her eyes but nods.  
"Oh, why not, it isn't as if I have anything else to do. What's its name?"  
"Her. She's a girl owl. Named Rabia." Bella smiles viciously.  
"Rabia? After Rabastan? Oh, that's sweet, isn't it. A little brown one, I suppose."  
"Yeah. Don't know what kind. She's a good owl," I add, a little defensively. Bella's smile gets even wider and more twisted.  
"It. It's an OWL, Lestrange, not your brother--or your sister. If you miss them that much, why don't you add something to that letter to Rabastan and ask him to send you a goldfish in a bag? Something to love..." My face is burning, probably bright red too. She's being VICIOUS.  
"Right, what did I do?"  
"Pardon?"  
"You're not normally like this." She looks confused, and then smiles again, running a hand distractedly through her hair.  
"Oh, well...this IS me, Lestrange. That other person, I don't know, maybe she's Andromeda or Narcissa or Mother pretending to be me, or me them. You've been oh so vulnerable, I thought I'd share a few things with you, too, in the interest of a long and enduring friendship." I knew it. She really is like me, underneath, not half so serious as she acts. Sadistic, petty, fickle, emotional, intense, and just a little annoying, tell the truth. I'll get used to it, though, I guess, the real person is always so much more interesting than the facade. More lively. Still not the sort of person you can talk to easily, but now it's because half the time she isn't listening.  
"Oh. I thought so, actually." She smirks.  
"No, you didn't, Lestrange you idiot." Again with the 'idiot'. I hate being called that.  
"Call me Roddy." She pretends to hesitate.  
"Uh...no." A pigeon flutters into the owlery, landing on the floor beside us. We both look down at it, then back up at each other.

The blood pours down the walls.

**Hope you enjoyed that little piece of...bonding. Yeah. Bonding. Yeah...**

**Next Chapter: By Request, Pigeon Goes Boom!**

**By Request, Reviews Are Answered:  
tarak795: Well...I made Rabbie look up your address so I could mail you Bella, but all he turned up was an eighty-year-old lady in Norway. He is currently being punished by withholding his caffeine.  
Lioness-of-Tortall-7: (updates) Well...um...sort of both, actually. Rab is most definitely his chewtoy, and yet they have a very close and very unhealthy relationship. Kind of an "I'm the only one allowed to drive you into paranoid, gibbering madness" thing. Complicated...and no doubt beyond my ability to write. But we'll see.  
Sienna Rhiannon Chase: No kidding. It's probably best that I don't acknowledge that I have actually done that when homework interferes with ...oops. Forget I ever said that.**

**Review. Please. Pretty please with a cherry on top?**


	8. Act Eight: We Are All Pigeons

**Disclaimer: This disclaimer joke stopped being funny several chapters ago. I bear no responsibility for my inability to write well. J. K. Rowling bears responsibility for creating such an engaging world that I write about it anyway. It's all your fault for encouraging fanfiction, Jo. (If you're reading this, although I'd be very surprised if you were, I would like to take this time to announce that you are utterly and completely brilliant, and my plotting is far too slipshod and my prose far too purple for me to ever be able to equal you. In fact, I worship you. Why do you THINK I'm wearing this outrageous habit? Ten points to anyone who gets the "joke".)  
A/N: Ladles, jellyspoons, and Ronald Bilius Weasley, I apologize for the hiatus. Don't talk to ME about road trips, Internet withdrawal, bad hotel food, getting damn sick of Pizza Hut, entire towns that smell strongly of manure, and/or ensuing writer's block.**

**We now return to our regularly scheduled carnage.  
I would like to thank tarak795 for inspiration for this chapter. No pigeons were harmed in the writing of this chapter, although my dear sweet mum was rather unsettled.**

**I would also like to call your attention to the fact that the rating is now M. (For new readers or the inattentive, the rating was originally T.) Frankly, this stuff is starting to disturb ME a little, so I figured it was warranted.**

**The Story So Far: Bellatrix, after a week at Hogwarts with everything going swimmingly, writes home to Narcissa to inform her that nothing much has happened. This is while Rodolphus has convinced himself that he's in love with her, Umbridge has gotten her into detention, and the other Slytherins are all quite scared of her. Yeah...She is forced to put up with Rodolphus being a boring conversationalist while she mails the letter, and relieves some stress by torturing a pigeon. Everything is going fine. Dun-dun-dun-DUUUUUUN.**

**In This Chapter: A pigeon dies, by popular request. Bellatrix contemplates mortality. A bad plan is made and executed, and then becomes a plot point. The other Slytherins show up again. Bellatrix has normal human social interaction thrust upon her. The first story arc plotted out in advance starts to get going.**

**Warnings: Pigeon death. Purple prose. Mild swearing in the A/N. (The reason I didn't mention this before is that I am vicious and sadistic. For further proof, observe that this fanfiction is about BELLATRIX (expletive) LESTRANGE.) Repeated use of a Wizarding racial slur. Squicky violence. (Skip the first bit if it makes you feel better.) Slytherite not being funny in the A/N. (The horror!)**

It was an art, wasn't it? Almost a science? Doing what she did? The bloodstains, they splattered in such a messy, uncontrolled way as the pigeon thrashed and writhed, as it tried to delay what was so right, so inevitable...did pigeons have minds? Did they weep at the inevitable tragedy of death, all that is born must die, sob sob? Did they understand her intentions, read something from her eyes and the twist in her smile and the cast of her face that terrified them and let them know just what was in store for them? And did their brothers and sisters and children remember, did they, did they revile her and fear her and warn their children against her, or were they too stupid? But they felt pain. She was sure they felt pain. Pain, polished and raw, hot and cold, so overwhelming that you'd go numb trying to process it all, consuming the spirit, bringing the mind to the fever pitch of insanity, and then she blew them apart and sometimes they stayed alive for a few more seconds and suffered horribly. Oh well. They were pigeons, after all, weren't they? Who cared about a pigeon but the pigeons themselves? She couldn't tell them apart, maybe they were all the same one, putting itself back together when she was gone and following her and getting itself killed again. Maybe they knew how worthless they were and death was some sort of mercy to them.  
"Pretty." They had opened it up. It hadn't quite died yet, and everything was still working. Pumping and bulging and wobbling. It made Bellatrix sick to watch it, blood was fine, beautiful, even, but this was different, repulsive, filthy, she didn't want to look at it. A machine made of flesh. Base, animal, gory. Was that what humans looked like inside, were they even half so revolting? Even her...? If she pricked her finger, she would bleed, when she put her fingers against her wrist she could feel bone and muscle and pumping blood. When she died her body would putrefy and stink and dissolve in the most hideous way possible. Even the purebloods didn't last, she had seen her grandmother Lucretia Rosier when they put her in the ground. A rotting corpse, that was all that was left of her, wasn't it? Dead, filthy, disgusting. And she had been so beautiful, she had been like Bellatrix, pureblooded and powerful and beautiful as well. Death made monstrosities of all, it dragged you down to the level of the Mudbloods, there was nothing good about a corpse. And how could Lestrange possibly find the filth and gore of even a living body beautiful? If he opened up Paternoster the Mudblood, would that be beautiful too?  
"Oh, you're disgusting, Lestrange, I can't stand to touch you." He glared at her. It was a new thing, having him annoyed with her, not furious, not raging like a madman, just annoyed. Almost as if he had begun to dislike her when she let her hair down a little. She had been so cold and dismissive to him, and he had been fascinated by her, and now she grated across his nerves. How ironic. Charming, in a way, or at least amusing. And if he hit her, that would be even better...he didn't hit her, he wouldn't, she hadn't cut deeply enough yet. And now she didn't have time, her energies were better focused on the pigeon, before it quietly slipped away and died without too much fuss. He did know what he was doing in that respect, at least. Both of them had blood on their hands, sticky and dark red, blood up to their wrists. Bloody red dabs on their wands and on the sleeves of their robes, smearing everywhere, probably it would give them both away and sell them into the hands of Dumbledore himself. Her family knew, anyway, they had seen the smears of blood on the cobblestones, all that was ever left except maybe a few feathers. And Lestrange's family probably knew, you could try to hide it all you liked but sooner or later someone would find a red stain on your robes, the mark of a killer, a torturer, and inevitably...a Dark wizard. Oh, but she wasn't one, not yet, not a Dark witch yet, she hadn't studied enough, hadn't learned enough, that was why she was here, to study what old Dumbledore hated the most right under his nose, she didn't know the Dark Arts yet. But she would. And for the moment...the title "pigeon killer" would suffice. Would the other Slytherin girls understand? Gossipy, brassy Rita and beautiful, idiotic, cutthroat Juliet and tetchy Evelyn and her dear little Agatha? Would they understand? What about Avery and Wilkes and Rosier and the one she didn't know? Would Rosier, for instance, understand what she did and why?

No doubt the others wouldn't either. It was the sort of thing, wasn't it, that could be so hard to explain in polite society, a secret little vice that was only spoken of indirectly or wordlessly, by your relatives, as some sort of proof that you were soft in the head. But Lestrange understood, and she understood. She understood the feeling, the way the blood rushed through your veins and brought you to the top of the world, where they all crawled on their knees and begged for mercy, and you were vicious and petty enough not to give it to them, and they all died horribly in some sort of regrettable tragedy. The need for it, the anger and the disgust and the lust to command. And she had a natural gift for destroying things...for taking a perfectly good pigeon and reducing it to a smear of blood...for breaking the minds of people like Abby Paternoster. And Paternoster was, after all, in her mind, just a pigeon...

Lestrange backed off a little, moving away, lowering his wand, to let his dear Bella have the final shot. And she did, of course, she had been doing it for years. Her head was pounding, there was red behind her eyes. She held her wand oh so carefully and took aim, letting her whole mind flow into that little red-gray body. She couldn't really control it, not when it got this far, it was the magic flowing out on its own now, almost like a random childhood spell, but it did what she wanted it to do...Splat. There was nothing much left of it now, feathers that would blend in with the feathers of the owls, a puddle of blood that could easily have some more feathers shoved over it, a few blood spatters on the owls, nothing anyone would notice. She turned to Lestrange.  
"Go ahead, what are you waiting for, do something to hide it! Or do you want us both to be caught?" The urgency in her tone was a put-on, a sham, she wasn't worried at all, but she did want to see him panic. Except, of course, that he didn't panic, almost out of spite, she thought. No, he just swept a few feathers over it, and the blood soaked through them at once.

She hadn't thought this out very much.

"What? What are you doing? Do something!" Lestrange just looked at her blankly.  
"This is something." Some little part of her mind was so grateful that she didn't know how to kill a human.  
"Something better, perhaps, if you think you can?" She was so ANGRY all of a sudden, she didn't deserve to be caught because of something so stupid. An idea was starting to take shape in her mind.  
"Like what?"  
"Shut up, be quiet, I think I know..." It was a bad idea, of course, but what else was there to do? First, she piled as many feathers over the bloodstain as she could find, gray and brown and white, forming a little heap. A few spots of blood still soaked through, but not as many. Then she knelt on the ground and began to look. Feathers...feathers...sweeping them all aside. It was filthy work, the feathers were getting smeared with the blood from her hands and her fingers were getting smeared with...she wasn't going to think about that. Finding the rat bones was almost a relief, shoving them randomly at the bloodstain, twisting the feathers into something that might look plausible as a kill site if you knew absolutely nothing about owls...maybe some owl had been sick and its pellets had been bloody. Yes. That would have to do. She wiped off her hand on her robes, inside her sleeve where it might not show, and then she grabbed Lestrange's shoulder and they ran for it.

He was out of breath when they got back to the Slytherin common room, he was panting, red-faced, even though they had slowed down once they were well away from the Owlery. They must be such a strange sight, she was still gripping his shoulder tightly and breathing just a little harder than she should...All of the other first years were sitting there, staring at them, as well as who knew how many other assorted Slytherins. Avery was there, putting the last touches on his essay, folded over the parchment with such a serious expression on his thin face. Rosier and Wilkes, oh, they went everywhere together, were playing chess (Wilkes was winning). Evelyn was slumped in one of the chairs, her cute little niece Agatha perched on her lap, chattering away happily with Juliet the half-blooded twit. And Rita was...where? Bellatrix's eyes flickered around the room, but Rita was gone, absent, doing whatever she did. Good riddance, too, she could be such an annoyance. There was no one else there that Bellatrix knew...she hadn't made a point of getting to know anyone, what was the point, really?  
Maybe Narcissa would have, or Mother dear, or Uncle Orion Dearest Dolt. But no, she knew eight of the ten first years, nine counting herself, of course, toad-faced Umbridge, who she had seen occasionally since the first night, Paternoster the Hufflepuff, who she had seen several times a day, with Paternoster always worse off for the encounter, and a few others by sight, but the fifth year in the corner, for instance, could have been from Mars for all she knew or cared. People annoyed her. Stupid, stupid, stupid, all of them were, all that they were, meaningless words and trite friendships and no brains whatsoever. The way ninety percent of the upper class had been for a hundred years. But the other ten percent changed things.  
There was a second year sitting in the chair she wanted, closest to the fire. A look proved insufficient to dislodge him. Grabbing his arm and pulling, struggling, and kicking, however, proved quite sufficient. It was a good chair, still warm from his touch, soft and comfortable yet high-backed and straight enough for her to look dignified. Almost more a throne than a chair. She was the queen, looking out over her pathetic subjects, who dropped to their knees and groveled before her. Too bad things didn't work that way in real life. You could get little worms like Paternoster to respect you without effort, but surrounded by those of equal birth, respect had to be earned... She glared at her fellow Slytherins. Agatha gave her a heartbreakingly CUTE smile back. Hard to believe the girl was eleven. The others all avoided her gaze. As if they were embarrassed to look, as if they respected her or feared her or knew something about her. Or knew something. What was there that they could possibly know? She was being stupid...Like Narcissa...

Agatha broke the awkward little silence, looking straight at Bellatrix, then away, then back again from the corner of her eye, as if she was nervous about something.  
"Miss Black? What have you been doing, Miss Black? I'm sorry if I'm intruding, but I haven't seen you all morning and I was worried..." She trailed off, looking embarrassed. Was she faking? No, she wasn't, she was like Narcissa, with everything that implied.  
"Detention. I've been in detention. Do you know what that is, Agatha dear? It's when you--" Rosier snickered, covering his mouth with his hand in an affected way. Wilkes kicked him under the table. Agatha, meanwhile, was nodding seriously.  
"Yes, I think I do know, but thank you for being nice enough to tell me, Miss Black." Nice? Agatha thought she was being NICE? Was the girl stupid, or just deluded beyond comprehension?  
"She isn't being nice, Aggie, not that YOU need telling," Evelyn said, topping her world-weary tone off with an eye-roll. Bellatrix wondered what she was talking about. Agatha was an innocent, wasn't she? "You know," Evelyn added, speaking now to the room in general, "detention might be good for her. Someone should teach her that other people don't play nice." Nobody spoke for a minute, perhaps contemplating whether they would 'play nice' or not.  
"Wow, YOU sound like a Slytherin," someone in a dark corner of the room commented, to general consternation.  
"Sound like a Slytherin? She IS a Slytherin, you dope! So are you!"  
"Yeah, well, most of us don't have our heads up our--"  
"That's enough." Bellatrix's hand clenched on her wand. The voice, everyone knew that voice. The door to the seventh year girls's dormitory, near the end of the room, had opened while nobody was looking, and Umbridge was strolling down the room to meet them, Rita Skeeter walking a few paces behind her looking supremely self-satisfied. Bellatrix could feel all eyes on her...what was going on? Had something happened that they hadn't told her about? Oh, yes, this was Slytherin, they'd probably set her up...

Umbridge walked over to a sixth year girl and smiled unpleasantly. It was the sort of smile Bellatrix couldn't help but admire for its effect on people. The poor unfortunate girl went white. "Dolores, I swear, I didn't do anything! I swear--" Umbridge's smile brightened. Bellatrix longed to hit her, to jinx her...the revulsion she inspired was that strong.  
"Precisely. Professor Turkle has asked me to inform you that you have detention with her in five minutes. Apparently you have not done your homework in a month. Tut tut. Oh well, we cannot all be academic achievers, can we? However, our kind professors do expect us to pass our classes." She waved a hand dismissively. The girl's face contorted.  
"That's not fair! Turkle's an old hag, she only likes her grandchildren anyway! I heard from Evaric she told that Findlay kid that if he signs up for her class in third year, she'll give him perfect grades no matter what! Is that fair, I ask you? Is that--"  
"If you had spent less time gossiping, you might well be passing Professor Turkle's class. You may very well be late for your detention now, so I would advise you to resume the matter later. Goodbye now." The girl scampered off, the blood rushing to her face turning it a nice shade of crimson. Umbridge shrugged, giggled in a way that grated across all of Bellatrix's senses, and began circling the Slytherins, making soft comments to a few of them, merely smiling at the others. It took less than a minute for her to reach Bellatrix's fellow first years, who were sitting more or less near each other.  
"Sit up straight, Jonathan." She tugged sharply on Avery's collar, and he jerked up. "Please don't glare at me in that unbecoming fashion, Edmund. The same goes for you, Evelyn." Wilkes and Evelyn muttered apologies. "Rodolphus, you have something red on your hand, your hair looks as if it has not been brushed for a week," (Bellatrix suspected that it hadn't been.) "and your posture is a disgrace. You really ought to do something about that. And Bellatrix..." All eyes turned to Bellatrix again.  
This was it, wasn't it? Umbridge had something against Bellatrix, didn't she? Ever since Bellatrix had insulted her in front of the rest of the first years? Oh, she had a gift for attracting attention, some sort of natural charisma. Sometimes it worked against her. Actually, it worked against her most of the time...call it a personality that would not stay in the background, a desire for respect, for prominence, disdain for those above her. Whatever you wished to call it. It had still gotten her into trouble. Was the blood on her sleeve visible at all? She didn't dare risk a glance.  
"What do you want?" A girl near Bellatrix hissed, "were you brought up by PIGS?" Umbridge glared at them both.  
"I wanted to talk to you...alone. Please don't make me reconsider." So she had attracted some high-flown attention after all, unless Umbridge planned to do this with all ten first years...She followed Umbridge out of the room, through a maze of corridors, and finally into a little alcove with two benches and a fountain. What a lovely little place in which, no doubt, to be yelled at. Merlin.

**A/N: Dun-dun-dun-DUUUUUN! Or something.**

**...I guess the moral of the story is, "do not make Dolores Umbridge mad or you will live to regret it"? Actually, Bellatrix has a talent for making people hate her. Which is, on the whole, not undeserved.**

**Professor Turkle and her dear grandson Findlay may well return in the future.**

**Next Chapter: Umbridge Says Stuff! And Does Stuff! Aren't You Excited?!**

**And now...I shall answer the reviews. Dun-dun-dun-duuuuun. Or something. Or not.  
Lioness-of-Tortall-7: Incest scares me rather a lot. Which is largely why I put it in. In my mind, the Lestranges are kind of the creepy weirdos of Wizarding high society. Not surprising, really, considering that they were willing to let Rodolphus marry dear Bella. Possibly only because Rabastan was a boy, though. (hands you brain bleach) Heheheh.  
Sienna Rhiannon Chase: Please don't kill me for describing the pigeon's death in glowing purple prose. It died a noble death, so that the readers could read about it and rejoice. Or be sick. Depends.  
Pet monkeys: Thank you. I like compliments. Compliments make me happy. Abby Paternoster apparently makes readers very happy. She was originally going to return in this chapter, but then I decided that what I had planned for this chapter was stupid and put in something else. Probably the original scene will pop up later on, very thinly disguised, in order to prevent me from actually having to think of more plot. I am a twisted and insidious person.  
tarak795: Well, I can draw stick figures. Just kidding, I can draw more than that. Although not MUCH more. I tried illustrating Act Five two weeks ago, but, to put it bluntly, it sucked.**

**Review. Or...something. Stuff...ness.**


	9. Act Nine: Just and Rightful Punishment

**Disclaimer: I own these people, up until J. notices that they're gone and contacts the police. I promise to dry-clean them before I get arrested and convicted of kidnapping fictional people. And I'll probably have to go to Azkaban. Which I do not own either.  
A/N: Wow, I really am horrible at updating on time. I would like to publically apologize for the hiatus. My first attempt at writing this chapter was so mind-bendingly awful that not only did I delete it, I took a nail file a microscope, and a small amount of soap, and physically removed all traces from the hard drive.**

**Anyway, I would like to inform you that we have run out of popcorn, due to a certain Mr. Ronald Weasley making off with it all. We have found out his location and had him shot.**

**The Story So Far: Bellatrix gleefully makes enemies of possibly the entire Slytherin first year, as well as prefect Dolores Umbridge. She then discovers that that was not a good idea when Rita Skeeter sells her out to Umbridge and nobody lifts a finger to help her. Umbridge takes her deep into the dungeons for a private conversation. Bellatrix has no idea what is going on, and a vague sense that she doesn't want to find out.**

**In This Chapter: She finds out. She doesn't like it. The plot, assuming here that there actually IS one, thickens. Readers who hate Evelyn and Agatha (there have to be a few, right?) will be very angry with me.**

**Warnings: Implied child abuse. A Very Special Chapter that only partially explains why Bellatrix hates authority figures (except for Voldy). (The other part is because she's as Chaotic Evil as it gets.) Mild blood. Violent fantasies. The last part being lousy because Slytherite really wants to get away from all the angst and work on her Death Note fanfic.**

"Please sit." Umbridge gestured to one of the marble benches, smiling widely. Defiantly, although possibly only she thought something so petty was worthwhile resistance, Bellatrix stayed where she was. Umbridge looked shocked for a fraction of a second, as if she couldn't possibly believe that anyone would disobey such a REASONABLE request, and then smiled again. "I'm sorry. I thought I asked you to sit"  
Bellatrix kicked her. Not hard, and less out of anger than contrariness, but even that was enough. Umbridge's toad face looked like wax, the smile pathetically artificial. Her eyes narrowed. "Very well--" She didn't have time to finish the sentence before Bellatrix dumped herself abruptly onto the bench. On the bench opposite the one Umbridge had picked out for her, of course. It wasn't as if she was going to be reasonable, or as if she had any intention of listening to her superior. And Umbridge shouldn't think that, even for a second, it might trick the poor thing into thinking she had any real power, or that Bellatrix respected her enough not to play petty games. Which, of course, meant that she didn't know Bellatrix at all. She had no intention.  
Bellatrix's condescending little mental monologue was cut off, right before things had gotten really interesting, as Umbridge smiled even more sweetly and sat on the first bench. Now that Bellatrix had the bench she had wanted, she had fought for, even, she was regretting it--it was a little closer to the fountain set into the wall, and the marble was regrettably slimy. She stood. So did Umbridge.  
"Yes"  
"Move," Bellatrix snarled, or something close to it but quieter, almost respectful, if she had been capable or willing, "I want that bench, the first one." Umbridge raised an eyebrow, but moved out of the way for Bellatrix to sit down. Umbridge the toad-face was being so accomodating. What DID she want?

When Umbridge had reseated herself, they were silent for a minute. Bellatrix didn't meet Umbridge's eyes. She didn't want to know what Umbridge was thinking, probably something dull and bureaucratic and mildly inconvenient. What would she think in such a situation? Pins under the sullen first year's fingernails? (It didn't work as well as all the puffed-up over-intellectual novelists who had never hurt a fly said. The one time Bellatrix had tried it, Andromeda had been able to pull away and the marks, when she showed their mother, had been incriminatingly obvious...) Hot ashes on the soft patch of skin under her eyes? Bellatrix's hand moved up, possibly of its own accord, to test the possibility. Her finger groped around the edge of her eye socket. Umbridge watched with polite interest. No, it wouldn't work on Bellatrix, her eyes were entirely the wrong shape and there wasn't enough space...Maybe it would work on Umbridge, though, if Bellatrix had had anything to burn or a spell to set it on fire. Neither of which she had, of course, didn't things always turn out that way if you turned your back on reality and didn't plan? So she would have to remember that and try to corner Umbridge alone in the common room one fine night before the fire burned down entirely...What did she want? What DID she want?  
"Bellatrix, I did not want to have this conversation," Umbridge said, calmly, maybe a little coolly, but politely enough.  
Bellatrix didn't answer. Her mind was already racing with thoughts, and at the moment she wasn't sure she could have pulled herself out of it and back into the reality of Umbridge and the little stone fountain and the unspoken threat of punishment. Funny how Umbridge said what she did. Almost as if she wanted it very much, but one must remember to observe the formalities, mustn't we? Sounds like a teacher. Sounds like Mother dear. Bellatrix, what is wrong with you, Bellatrix, you're a shame to the family, Bellatrix, and how I wish it hadn't come to this, Bellatrix, but I really can't help hating you... Umbridge wasn't anything like Mother, that was obvious enough, different as night and day, blah blah blah blah, and yet they talked the same way, they talked to her the same way, as if she was already on the path to disgrace and ignoble death...And you could never, ever get them to be quiet, always carping at you, always trying to make up for their own powerlessness, their weakness, and yet we're all afraid of them and we want to see them dead. Isn't life stupid?  
Bellatrix's fingernails were three centimeters deep in the flesh of her hands, and there was warm red blood oozing from at least one of the cuts she didn't realize were there until Umbridge's gaze floated down to Bellatrix's clenched hands and then back up to her face contorted with hatred for Umbridge or her mother, who cared which? "Oh, dear me, do you need a handkerchief?" Bellatrix didn't answer, wiping her hand across the white surface of the marble and letting the blood soak into the porous stone, destroying the beautiful virgin white. Umbridge watched her for a moment, and then resumed speaking. "As I was saying, Bellatrix, before you distracted my attention, I did not want to have to say this. The Blacks are, let me say, a well-respected family, and I thought they might have raised you better than this..."  
"Oh, how insulting," Bellatrix muttered, sitting up straighter and glaring into Umbridge's eyes. Umbridge was a short girl; her eyes were very nearly level with six-years-younger Bellatrix's, and she was only taller because of a stray brown curl that stood almost straight up. If Bellatrix had done anything elaborate with her thick black hair, she would have been taller by almost an inch. She shifted position slightly to hold her head higher, mentally claiming victory when Umbridge didn't do the same.  
"Your family is not at fault. The blame rests entirely on your shoulders."  
"There we go, Umbridge, it is entirely my fault. Which part? The bloody death of your beloved mum? Want to hear how she screamed?" Bellatrix threw her head back and shrieked for a few seconds. Umbridge scowled. Bellatrix smiled at her sweetly, or something that could have been mistaken for sweet by an infant, assuming that the infant didn't see her smile and burst into hysterical tears, traumatized for life... Umbridge returned the smile, but it looked forced.  
"Be serious, Bellatrix. This is not a game, and I can and will punish any other tasteless...was that supposed to be a joke?" She paused. Bellatrix rolled her eyes. "Is it true, as Rita Skeeter claims, that you stormed out of the dormitory on Sunday night in a fit of pique, after insulting Evelyn Burke's family"  
"Care to hear what I said about them?"  
"Bellatrix, I am warning you for the last time." Umbridge's patience was obviously draining away to nothing. Bellatrix opened her mouth to say the final thing that might push her over the edge, but some little fragment of her mind screamed "Don't do it, don't do it, do you want another detention?", and she closed her mouth again, struggling to remain vaguely civil, nasty little comments floating through her mind. Umbridge nodded. "Good. Now, is it also true that you called Evan Rosier a 'stupid pansy?"  
"Yes. He deserved--"  
"No," said Umbridge, "he did not. And did you also, on a separate occasion, ask him if he 'was sure his mother hadn't really wanted a daughter and raised him in a dress'?"  
"Yes."

And so it went, for close to half an hour. That was the pattern, more or less, Umbridge reciting a litany of complaints that Rita Skeeter had scrounged from who-knew-where, Bellatrix admitting to each and every crime with her head held high and a smile on her pretty face. Sometimes Bellatrix volunteered more information, often disturbing little snippets that made Umbridge flinch: that, as well as some sort of strange pride, was the point. More often she just mocked the victim, Umbridge, or the question. Oh, of course she knew that there would likely be a punishment at the end of the cheerful confessions, but who cared about that? She was having so much fun. Not quite the same as actually doing the things, of course, but there was so much perverse pleasure in watching Umbridge mentally revise her estimate of Bellatrix's moral failures, blanching when she said something horrific and grimacing when she said something petty. She had heard about the Inquisition, her parents had mentioned it to her when they were explaining about Muggles, and the old windbag Binns might have mentioned it once or twice, and she had read accounts of some of the confessions, extracted under heinous torture. Why bother with the torture, really? Even when you knew you were going to be fed to the flames...

It was almost a shame when it ended. Who knew Bellatrix had done so many horrible things her first week? What sort of person would dare? Oh, they were mostly just insults, a physical fight with Avery (McGonagall had broken it up) on Wednesday, and splattering Juliet's bed with ink on Friday, nothing heinous at all, but still more than enough to earn her a week of detentions. Umbridge didn't know that she had threatened to kill Lestrange two hours ago, he had been loyal and hadn't said anything, if he had even understood what she meant, he lived in cloud-cuckoo land most of the time, and he got on her nerves so he had more than deserved it. The worst thing she had done, by far. A loyal young man, a little slow, but kind and loving nonetheless, and she had threatened to kill him, and she had hurt him physically, and he had stood there and taken it up until he didn't take it anymore and he lashed out at her and hurt her and his hands were around her throat...Merlin, his hands had been around her THROAT...and her heartbeat had slowed and her mind had gone foggy and she had known, she had been SURE that he was going to choke her or snap her neck, and then he had had mercy on her and let her go. Punishment for the cruel girl who had teased him and hurt him and taken him for granted. What an awful person she was. Immoral, sadistic, she should be locked away where she could never hurt poor delicate Lestrange again.  
And Umbridge didn't know what an awful, awful person she was, she was punishing her for nothing, really, how funny. She didn't realize that she was really laughing, on the outside as well as in her head where no one could hear her, until Umbridge reached across the fountain and slapped her in the face. Hard enough to sting, the girl wasn't strong but Bellatrix hadn't been prepared for the blow and it felt like there were red-hot needles in her blood and they were all rushing to the surface of her skin and burning a million tiny holes as the blood pushed them out. And she was angry. No, furious. Umbridge had no right to hit her, prefects had no authority to punish you physically, she hadn't read the rule-book but she knew, she just KNEW that dear sweet old codger Albus whatshisname Dumbledore would never allow this if he had heard a word about it. Bellatrix raised her hand to the place on her cheekbone where Umbridge's hand had made contact, running her fingers over the spot as if she couldn't believe it was there and was a little worried it might fall off.  
Umbridge had HURT her. Like Mother had hurt her. Over and over again, try to get away but she's stronger and faster and Narcissa doesn't want to see so she runs from the room and hides her eyes and you hide the burns and hate Mother and hope she dies and sometimes, in the dead of night, you make plans to kill her... Bellatrix hadn't cried for a long, long time. Umbridge was an amateur at pain...Seventeen, eighteen years old and she knew nothing about how to find the places that you never show anyone, the places where your mind is soft and unprotected, the wounds that haven't had a chance to scar and maybe never will. You found those places, and if you were really good, the way Bellatrix was good, you could open new ones...Physical. Mental. Emotional. They were all tools...And if you knew how to use them right, you could crush someone into a little smear of blood. And Umbridge DIDN'T know, she didn't understand that whatever she had brought up out of the dark places in Bellatrix's mind had scarred over a million times until nothing could ever hurt her anymore.

Umbridge spoke to her in a softer voice than before, almost a whisper, silky and dangerous and trembling with barely suppressed anger. "And you have been tormenting Abby Paternoster for a week. Emotionally, intellectually, and, I believe, although I admit that I currently have no proof, physically"  
"Do you want proof?" Bellatrix snapped. She had been angry with Umbridge before, almost once, twice a day, like clockwork, but she had never been furious. Acrimonious. How DARE Umbridge make her hurt in those little ways she had tried so hard to forget? The humiliation? The shame? The burning, impotent rage, knowing that you can never strike back and you will never be strong enough to hurt her the way she hurts you? And the smothering feeling as she crushes all your basest instincts with her stupidity and empty cynicism? And Umbridge is just like Mother...She had been laughing, she had thought it was funny at first, but she hadn't seen the parallels then. Both of them. Such a useless waste of space. Did they live to hurt her? And then they went on with their stupid, empty, meaningless lives. And she could kill them both.

Realization. Epiphany. Kill them and you'll be free of everything they ever did to hurt you. And she would do it, she could do it. The way she killed the pigeons. They didn't call that murder, but it was the same, really. Imagine taking Umbridge into one of the empty classrooms, "for a little privacy", and picking up your wand and...what? A mental blank. There had to be some spell, didn't there? Something that would work on a human? But she didn't know. Merlin, she had made the plan, she had the time to carry it out, and she didn't even KNOW! Another thing to learn at Hogwarts...wasn't school wonderful?

Her anger was gone. There was no need to hate anymore. She smiled sweetly at Umbridge, a real smile, happy and childlike and carefree. Because nothing Umbridge could do to her could warrant revenge anymore. It had been such an easy decision to make, really, who knew that this was the way to happiness? Really, she had already made the same decision a million times. The pain Paternoster felt, the way she feared her, wasn't that all a lead-up to the final decision about her fate? Nothing new, nothing new. The fantasies she had had...well, they were the same thing, weren't they? It was hard to hate Umbridge when, in her mind's eye, Bellatrix was watching blood trickle from her mouth.

She spoke more quietly, matching Umbridge's tones, but with an irrepressible happy tinge that might well have told Umbridge everything.  
"No, not physically, I haven't laid a wand on Paternoster. Not yet, anyway, why do you ask?" Umbridge frowned.  
"I'm afraid you never will. I have made the decision, and," she tapped her wand on the fountain for emphasis, "we prefects do have the authority to do this, whatever you might think"  
Bellatrix couldn't stop herself.  
"What decision? Why aren't you telling me? What are you trying to hide from me?" Umbridge's frown deepened, and Bellatrix could have sworn that she caught a quickly suppressed eye-roll.  
"Please let me finish. While we were discussing your misbehavior, I decided that you should not be allowed around the school alone"  
"Merlin," Bellatrix muttered, a vague sense of dread running up her spine and into the place behind her eyes where her darkest thoughts lived. If her parents had let her hear anything of the sort, she would have sworn. From cheerful to grim in five seconds, give or take.  
"Yes, it is unfortunate, is it not?"  
"Shut up."  
"Happily, Agatha Jugson has agreed, without reservation, to accompany you everywhere you go." Umbridge smiled widely. "I'm sorry, is something wrong?"

**I really like Agatha. No, really, right?**

**Review Answer Thingy, Blah Blah Blah:**

**tarak795: Bellatrix may very well contemplate murdering Umbridge again in the future. She may also become a prefect. I dunno. (Can you tell I'm not plotting this very far ahead?)**

**Unfortunately, I have no idea how to get the popcorn back from dead!Ron. Reviews will instead be rewarded with...a dead fish!**

**Hey, where'd everybody go?**


	10. Act Ten: Endless Torture Routine

**Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. I don't even own Bellatrix. Given that she is holding her wand to my head as I write this, I think it could safely be said that she owns me.**

**A/N: Wow, it's been months since I updated last. Sweet zombie Dumbledore tap-dancing naked with a pogo stick.**

**There are several reasons for the story going on hold. One, I discovered that I couldn't really keep up with the one-chapter-a-week strategy without a major drop in quality (see chapters eight and nine for an example of a major drop in quality). Frankly, I was getting burned out, and the last few chapters were dreadful. Forgive me. Two, the last few chapters were dreadful, which I did not realize at the time but sure as hell realized two weeks later. They read like Crabbe and/or Goyle wrote them while under the influence. Bellatrix was abused by her mother? Rabastan was rapidly becoming a Marty Stu to end all Marty Stus, without ever appearing onscreen? There was more purple prose than plot? All three of those developments will henceforth be ignored, if I have to make Druella into Mickey Mouse, kill Rabastan prematurely in the most ignoble fashion possible, and narrate every single chapter from the point of view of someone who can actually speak coherent English! And three, I'm lazy. And I had a lot of other obligations. The typical excuses.**

**Anyway, we return to our regularly scheduled pennydreadful. I think I'm going to get rid of the updating schedule or relax it a little; you saw what happened when I was working under a deadline, right? Don't worry, I won't let it become a deadfic. (I even wrote an ending during the hiatus that is to be posted if I die horribly before I complete the story. See, I DID take precautions.)**

**We think Bellatrix blew up the popcorn in a fit of frustration, but we do have soy crackers. (watches audience members, who are really only here for the food, leave yet again)**

**The Story So Far: Bellatrix gets on Umbridge's bad side, which you should never do, but Bellatrix is reckless and a bit crazy and that did not occur to her until it was far too late. Now she has Agatha Jugson under prefectorial orders to follow her around at all times. Yes, that Agatha. Hilarity ensues. Everyone except possibly Rodolphus frankly thinks she got what she deserved.**

**In This Chapter: Three and a half weeks later, Bellatrix mopes, most uncharacteristically. She gets what she deserves: no pigeons for YOU! Rodolphus demonstrates a certain degree of badassery. We are reminded that Hufflepuffs exist for a reason. Bellatrix makes a deal.**

**Warnings: Violent fantasies. Some bad language (mostly in the Hufflepuff segment). Cruelty to Hufflepuffs.**

"Bella..." His shaggy brown hair was unkempt and matted with blood. It was stuck to his forehead. A trickle of blood was running down into his eye. Unfortunate for him. Another stroke.  
"Close your eyes!"  
He smiled, unbelievably.  
"I...can't..." Another stroke. He screamed. Like a pigeon. He really shouldn't, she thought tranquilly, carelessly, be alive right now. "Bella," he said. Not pleading. Just saying it, perhaps, for something to say. An acknowledgement of his feelings for her. It might have been tiresome, she was so easily bored, but the situation warped it and turned it funny. So funny. He wasn't even pleading. She laughed.  
"Bella," she moaned, imitating his deep voice. "Bella. Merlin," she added, switching back to her normal voice, harsh and critical, "are you just too stupid to know that you should plead?"

He was.

She killed him anyway.

She had gone on to Avery by the time Professor McGonagall rapped her sharply on the head.

"Kindly pay attention, Miss Black." In her mind's eye, something rather grotesque happened to Avery, and his face was replaced by McGonagall's. The incongruity persisted even as the fantasy dissolved around her, McGonagall's face remaining where it had been in Bellatrix's field of vision, but this time attached to the correct body. She was standing across from Bellatrix's desk in the front row, her arms folded.

Bellatrix might have felt better about the whole thing if McGonagall had been foaming at the mouth and dragging her off to detention. Then she could have struggled. She could have righteously hated McGonagall. But she was a teacher, wasn't she? She was doing her job; as Rita had leaned over to whisper to Avery, McGonagall had silenced them with a look. For that, Bellatrix could be grateful.  
She hated it. Being indebted to the woman who had caught her slacking off. Who had exposed her human weakness to the whole classroom. They would remember. And Bellatrix had no way to erase their memories. They wouldn't speak of it around her, of course, Lestrange would stop them even if Bellatrix herself was being smothered under Agatha's watchful eye and her unspoken prohibition against violence. But even he would remember that Bellatrix had been shown up.

Had McGonagall planned that? Catching Bellatrix in a trap? If you're a good girl, McGonagall's eyes said, you'll get off probation early. But to be a good girl, the slights that you'll have to ignore will be tremendous. Even if you do ignore them, the cost to your pride, your honor, the respect that you used to have...why bother? It's your freedom on the line either way.  
And it didn't cost the stupid old woman a thing. Bellatrix's mind was ripping itself apart at the seams, one half straining for freedom, the other half holding back. It was only a flimsy connection at the best of times that held together all the different elements of her psyche. It was unraveling.

Under the table, Agatha Jugson, sitting directly to Bellatrix's right, squeezed her hand.

Bellatrix's anger, surging through her mind to the effigy of McGonagall she had set up to destroy, hit a solid barrier and changed course to strike Agatha instead. The imagery that flashed through her mind, a hundred fully realized fantasies playing out in the space of a second, had never been bloodier or more perverse. Agatha and McGonagall had starring roles.

"Yes, Professor," she said. Said it calmly, with a thin veneer of pleasantness, not snarled. Albeit through clenched teeth.

McGonagall glared at her for a moment, an infinitesimal second, before returning to her lecture on the limits of Transfiguration. It was an interesting one, thankfully. Interesting enough to keep the filthy bloody daydreams out of her head for once. She couldn't afford to get lost in them again. Oh, she knew why they were so frequent now, so insistent, so horrifically gory. It was because of deprivation.

When was the last time she had seen blood in real life? Three weeks at least. The blood in her dreams was far redder than in reality. No one screamed as much as her mental Avery had. Her subconscious knew what she should be doing, what she wanted to be doing.

Agatha and Umbridge had died more than a few times in her mind. Especially Agatha. Umbridge gave the orders, true, but it was Agatha holding the reins...

The lecture was only just barely interesting enough to stop her reaching over and making those dreams a reality. (Not that she knew how. She couldn't kill. She was too young and inexperienced. But she could, in all probability, wound...)  
She almost missed the end of it, left staring blankly at McGonagall for a few seconds before her consciousness reasserted itself. In the last few minutes, she had slipped back into a daydream; oh, she had kept one eye and one ear on her teacher, but that had only been to avoid another scolding and she had been incorporating the concepts into the script for her fantasy in any case. No doubt her little murder-plays were more realistic, adhering more strictly to the true laws of magic, than they had been. She had done her homework religiously in any case, because everyone knew that slackers learned nothing and those who didn't watch and learn and remember lost. But she had been spending far more time on it lately.

It wasn't as if there was anything else to do.

Bellatrix was one of the last to get up and hand in her homework. Merlin, she had been sliding out of reality more and more lately. The thoughts were piling up inside her mind and forcing themselves out into daily life, now that she couldn't process them in her usual bloody way. It was like trying to deal with a truculent, pushy stranger who insisted on having a say in every aspect of her existence. She would be walking down the hall, calmly as ever, not talking much, not that there was much to say, and for no reason reality would grow thin and blood would spatter across her vision and she would be dead to the world for far, far too long. They were noticing.

She dropped her essay (three rolls of parchment, slaved over for two nights, even when the pretty drops of red ink on the parchment tried to tempt her into her more usual activities) on McGonagall's desk wordlessly. McGonagall looked up, raising her head subtly, and their eyes met for a second. Woman and girl sized each other up; it was not a meeting of equals. Neither of them was foolish enough to think that it could be. Not then, at least. Someday, Bellatrix said silently. She was getting worse at keeping her thoughts to herself, too: her lips moved.

She didn't even try to join her friends (friends?) as they left the classroom. There wasn't much to say. She followed them, a few paces behind, watching their conversation. No doubt Avery was whining again, and Wilkes regarded all and sundry with the same suspicious eye, and Rosier was doing his best to lift all their spirits with his upbeat, chipper manner. Good for them. Doing the same thing that they'd done for weeks on end now. The same thing they'd probably be doing in five years, in ten. Such a friendship, built on backstabbing and false smiles. Oh, that wasn't to disparage them. She'd never been good at it, sadly, but she did understand the need. Didn't Mother and Father play politics? She knew about false friendship.  
And she liked the four of them, as much as someone like her really could.

Some part of her (she'd be embarrassed to admit to it) wished, in weakness and in emotional fragility, that she was up there with them, laughing her head off with them.

She watched. She listened. And she corroded and twisted with resentment.

Bellatrix was sure that Lestrange wanted to speak to her again. He'd followed her, as it happened, for a few days after Umbridge laid down the ruling, but Bellatrix had been too angry and disgusted to speak to him then, and horror of horrors, he'd eventually given up. He stared at her, sometimes, when he thought she wasn't looking, but he never approached her now.  
All he would have to do was ask. Angry and in despair as she was, she would still have welcomed some companionship that wasn't sickeningly-sweet Agatha. Merlin, Rodolphus got on with Agatha, even! They were like sister and brother! And he wasn't talking to HER either!

That was when it finally occurred to Bellatrix that, just possibly, Lestrange was under the same sanctions. 'No fighting, Roddy, or I'll have to report you--and you can stay away from that girl!' Yes, Umbridge would want to get them both out of play, no doubt. Lestrange was even more of a 'troublemaker' than she was, if only because he was stupid enough to get caught...  
Well, that was interesting. She considered it. She hadn't seen Umbridge talking to Lestrange, but that didn't mean anything, she could have done it later or sent a male prefect in her place. And come to think of it, she hadn't seen Lestrange doing his usual scrapping and fighting in the corridors either.

Maybe, said her mind, he was just disheartened by the loss of his dear Bella and he didn't want to continue on his own. Yes, she said, because when he broke little Rabastan's fingers back at home, he was really thinking of a girl he'd never heard of. No, Umbridge had him, she was sure of it, he was chafing under the same restrictions that were killing her slowly. Oh, of course, he didn't have someone watching his every move, because he was trustworthy enough, and...it didn't make sense. Her little theory didn't make sense. Oh, yes, of course Lestrange was her best friend, as much as she had one, anyway! That didn't mean she understood his psyche.  
Bellatrix, to her great displeasure, found herself once again running up against her own mental limitations. She was an intelligent girl--wasn't that enough? No. No, it wasn't. Merlin, strategizing and controlling and making plans for all eventualities had never been her forte. It was almost sad, she thought in disgust, that she was reduced to mental gymnastics. Who cared if Lestrange would get his throat slit for disobedience?  
And yet, frustrated and defeated and wondering what in Merlin's name she was doing, she quickened her pace to catch up to the four boys, forcing Agatha to trot after her at double speed to prevent from losing her entirely. Which, of course, was a nice little side benefit.

Coincidentally, several hallways down, after listening to the boys prattle for ten minutes of her life that she would never get back, Bellatrix turned a corner with the rest of them and nearly ran over a Hufflepuff. The corridor was full of them; they were scattered along its entire length like cockroaches. Most unfortunately, she didn't see Abby Paternoster among them, although of course the stupid girl might have taken to her heels as soon as she heard the Slytherins coming.

'What were Hufflepuffs for?' she found herself wondering. Surely Hogwarts could have made do with three houses, without one designated specifically for victims?

The leader of the Hufflepuffs, a tall, monumentally ill-favored ginger-haired boy with narrow brown eyes, was glaring at them. Oh, well. That wasn't good. At least she'd have an excuse for the carnage she wasn't going to be participating in...  
"What're you doing down here?" he demanded. "This is our hallway." Avery, Wilkes, and Lestrange exchanged glances.  
"Sorry," said Rosier sheepishly, to universal disgusted stares, "we didn't know." Bellatrix had never found herself hoping for a mob of Hufflepuffs (a mob? Of Hufflepuffs? Probably all Mudbloods) to maul an innocent (innocent?) Slytherin before. "Come on," Rosier added, half-turning back, "we'll find another way through."

"We," said Wilkes, rolling his eyes in the most blatant manner possible, "will not."  
"Yeah," said the Hufflepuff, perhaps imagining that he sounded fierce, "you will."  
"Bugger off," another Hufflepuff goon chipped in. The entire mob immediately started chattering. (To Bellatrix, it sounded rehearsed.)  
"We were here first!"  
"Yeah, bugger off!"  
"Make them pay to go through!"  
"Stupid rich Slytherins!"

The leader stepped forward, away from the rank and file. To Bellatrix's surprise, the Slytherin boys looked nervously at one another, as if assessing each other's capabilities in a fight. More than one set of eyes flew to Bellatrix, and she distinctly heard Avery whisper,  
"Not her! She's a lunatic!" Bellatrix would have been angry if it hadn't been so pathetic.  
"So you'll do it?" Wilkes whispered back, equally loudly.  
Avery looked even more nervous. The Hufflepuffs were a lot bigger than he was, poor thing.  
"I didn't say that! I just thought that maybe we should go with someone...well..."  
"I'd prefer not to," Rosier said in a perfectly normal tone of voice. If he had been standing one inch closer, Bellatrix would have violated the terms of her probation just to be able to kick him. Her fingers closed around her wand. She should do it. They needed someone who knew what she was doing in a fight. Agatha (Rita was probably miles away) could be a witness for pesky Umbridge and say that the Hufflepuffs had attacked (Hufflepuffs? Attacking?) first. She stepped forward, not bothering to do it unobtrusively--what would be the point?

"I'll do it," said Lestrange. Merlin. So Bellatrix's theory was wrong after all. He wasn't under any sanctions. And she was.

Sometimes she wanted to strangle Rodolphus Lestrange.

What made him think he could do it? He was an idiot. Oh, certainly, he was a big strong boy and he was used to blacking his adorable baby brother's eye once or twice a week, but from what she had heard about Rabastan that wasn't much of a challenge. It would be a magical duel, anyway, older students rarely had to resort to physical violence. He was in first year, and hardly the best student in the class.  
It was as if Narcissa had decided to fight a dragon. If they were lucky, they might find her hair ribbon after it was all over. (The image briefly filled Bellatrix's mind.)

Even the Hufflepuffs didn't take him seriously. What an insult.  
"Oh, God, what is that?"  
"Is it human?"  
"I think it's a first year!"  
"I thought you only got those in museums!"

Lestrange regarded them impassively (he seemed capable of only one expression, but the Hufflepuffs didn't need to know that).  
"Shut up," he said, and then sank his fist into the stomach of one of the gawkers.

In seconds they were upon him. Howling, attacking as one. Spells danced across the stone floor. Someone's glasses clattered against the wall. The tapestries on the walls deadened the cacophony.  
It really didn't take very long for it to be over. There wasn't much to watch. It couldn't have been a minute (Bellatrix checked her watch) from the time the first punch was thrown to the time the Hufflepuffs stepped back, victorious, leaving Lestrange moaning, sprawled on the floor in a private symphony of pain, the other Slytherin boys staring idiotically down at him.  
Merlin, what was next? Avery was standing right in front of Bellatrix. Ignoring his tiny yelp, she yanked him out of the way and knelt down by Lestrange's side. Amazingly, he smiled warmly at her.  
"Bella?"  
Her hand was on his stomach, close to his ribs. She felt around briefly until her fingers found the bone, and shoved her hand underneath and down. Hard. She didn't really expect it to hurt; it was a pleasant surprise when he shuddered.  
"We," she said, mustering all the ferocity she could put into her voice, "will talk later." And, still on her knees, she slid her wand out of her pocket, pointed it up and backward, and sent sparks dancing and glittering into the faces of the Hufflepuff goons.

That was when Agatha quietly, with the minimum of fuss, pulled her into an empty classroom and closed the door.  
"Miss Bellatrix?"  
Bellatrix ripped her wrist out of Agatha's hand, glaring. Agatha, unperturbed, smiled at her as sweetly as ever. More bloody, filthy fantasies blazed through Bellatrix's mind, most of them things that she could easily accomplish...she was probably in enough trouble already, wasn't she?  
"What?" she spat, all of her stored-up anger from the past three weeks beginning to spill out. She should have been in that fight. Lestrange didn't know what he was doing. None of them knew what they were doing. She was the only one who could even begin to spare them. "I know," she added, deliberately unpleasantly. "This is about the sparks, isn't it?"

Agatha looked around the classroom nervously, her fingers locked together in a gesture of...prayer? Bellatrix didn't understand. Agatha had her trapped, didn't she?

"Well," Agatha said reluctantly, "not exactly." She looked down, chewing her lip. Bellatrix was in no mood to be sympathetic.  
"Go ahead, Aggie," she snapped, pressing into service Evelyn Burke's nickname for her shy niece (why did she remember these things?). "I can hardly BREATHE at you without risking detention, can I?"  
Agatha smiled again.  
"Well," she said softly, "that's true. Miss Dolores" (it took Bellatrix a second to remember that Dolores was Umbridge's first name) "really is being very hard on you."

Something about this, about the way she dismissed all Bellatrix's misdeeds, struck a nerve.

"No," Bellatrix said proudly, and rather stiffly, "it's what I deserve. Did Rita tell you what I've done?"  
Agatha kept smiling.  
"Well, yes, she did mention it." Her smile faded briefly. "Did you really do all of those things?"  
"Aren't they too outrageous to make up?" said Bellatrix, pretending to be shocked. Agatha smiled again.  
"I suppose so," she said in her breathy little-girl voice. "You're an awful person," she added cheerfully.

Bellatrix wasn't sure whether to be offended or not.  
"Yes," she said after a minute, "I am."

Agatha nodded seriously.  
"That's too bad, Miss Bellatrix," she said earnestly, "I'm afraid that I now find myself atoning for misdeeds that I know you don't regret."  
Silence. Atoning? Images of Agatha with a whip, flagellating herself as penance for the unashamed sinner, floated to the surface.  
"You should have known that before you started," she said irritably. "Lestrange told you about the pigeons, did he not?"  
Agatha looked blank.  
"Pigeons?" Her irrepressible smile came back a little. "Oh...I understand. You're really not a very nice person at all, are you?" She turned slightly to stare wistfully out the window. Bellatrix had to fight down the urge to jinx her. "I thought Roddy had told me everything," Agatha added after a minute. "I noticed that you seemed depressed, so I thought I had to ask. I wasn't snooping," she added hastily, "I thought maybe I could help. But he didn't tell me about the pigeons."

"You're judging me," Bellatrix snarled.  
"No," Agatha said serenely, "I'm not. I don't really like you," she added with disarming honesty, the sort of honesty Bellatrix had nothing to say to, "but that's personal."  
"You don't understand," Bellatrix half-shrieked, her rage and...fear?...discharging themselves again. Oh, so much emotion had piled up in her mind over three weeks of depression and intermittent stifled rage...  
"I think I do," said Agatha.  
"Narcissa never did!" whispered Bellatrix.

Silence. Bellatrix tried to take it back, but it was too late.  
"I didn't mean that," she muttered, her emotions dropping away.  
Agatha smiled understandingly.  
"Knowing about the pigeons doesn't bother me," she said simply. "Auntie Evelyn and Miss Juliet, yes, but not me. I'm willing to let you keep doing it."

More silence. Oh, it was a revelation for Bellatrix. Some small part of her worldview seemed to have fallen away, throwing the rest into confusion and disorder. Her persecutor...wasn't her persecutor...but she had to be...what was she doing?  
"You are?" came tumbling out of her mouth. Too fast.  
Agatha raised an eyebrow. The expression looked so wrong on her innocent face.  
"Yes, I am."  
"What do you want from me?" Bellatrix hissed. Suspicion didn't seem unwarranted. Who knew what went on in the mind of someone like Agatha? Nothing was for free, unless you were hopelessly naive, and even little Agatha wanted to play...  
"Well--" Agatha hesitated. Bellatrix took a step forward: their faces were now almost touching. Agatha shivered. "I would be in a lot of trouble if Miss Dolores found out. I would need you to keep it secret."  
"You think," Bellatrix scoffed, half amused, half insulted, "that I can't do that?"

Agatha smiled.  
"And I'd need proof you'd reformed."  
"I can give you that."  
"Well..." Agatha hesitated again. "I want you to try to make friends, real friends, with all the Slytherins in our year."

Bellatrix, much to her own surprise, barely hesitated. The blood was already pouring down the insides of her eyelids. And after all, she could always break the promise later. Who cared about Agatha Jugson's hurt feelings?  
"Fine, then," she muttered, "I'll do it." And she smiled. It was obviously forced, but Agatha smiled back anyway and they shook hands. It was so nice to be on speaking terms with someone at last.

As they walked to the door, something occurred to her.

"And the Hufflepuffs? Am I allowed to avenge poor Lestrange and the honor that he never had?"  
Agatha smiled once again.  
"You're on your own with that one."

Late that night, after everyone had gone to bed, a mouse scuttled across the Slytherin common room.

It only got halfway before Magister-Smith the tabby cat pounced. Pounced, trapped, but didn't kill.

And Bellatrix detached from the shadows in the corner and stepped forward, an evil smile lighting up her pretty face.

She slept well that night, for the first time in weeks.

**A/N: Just for a change of pace, a mouse dies instead of a pigeon.**

**(dodges angry PETA rioters)**

**And, because I know I'll get flamed for this, I'll say that Rodolphus isn't (that) stupid. Neither is Agatha, apparently. Bellatrix thinks everyone is stupid.**

**The Hufflepuff mob will be making more appearances in the future.**

**Next Chapter: Plans for Revenge**

**Reviewers will recieve a dead mouse. A yummy tasty dead mouse.**


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